Bud the parrot is a talker, but is he a witness to murder?
The African grey parrot has been parroting a startling sound that may be the last words of a dead man.
Bud’s previous owner Martin Durum was shot and killed in his home in Saranac, Michigan in May 2015.
Owner killed, wife survived
Durum’s wife Glenna survived a gunshot to her head.
Bud is now living with Christina Keller who used to co-own the parrot when she was married to Martin Durum. After their divorce, Durum kept the bird.
But after his death, Keller took the bird back to her house. Keller says that for months now Bud has repeated these words over and over:
Don’t f—ing shoot.”
Keller believes those were Duram’s final words which the parrot remembers and is mimicking. The bird talks in her ex-husband’s voice.
Bird seems to replay murder
Every few days, the bird, according to Keller, seems to replay the murder with a performance of what sounds like two people–a male voice and a female voice–arguing.
It culminates in the bird repeating the words not to shoot.
While Keller admits its possible the bird may have heard those words from a TV show, she is convinced he’s mimicking her ex-husband because the parrot uses Durum’s voice.
Newaygo County Prosecutor Robert Springstead said he plans to decide soon on whether to file charges in the death, but he said he has no plans to rely on the parrot as evidence.
In 1993, a judge in a similar murder case in California was asked to also consider evidence from an African Grey parrot. The judge refused.
