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Jakarta Globe - Jambi Police said on Monday that a man with a long rap sheet had been arrested for the killing of a female Sumatran Tiger in Taman Rimbo Zoo last month, but two other suspects were still at large.

Sheila, who was the only Sumatran tiger remaining at the zoo, was killed and skinned on the zoo grounds after being drugged by poachers early on Aug. 22, leaving virtually nothing behind except the innards and a few ribs of the animal, which is critically endangered in the wild.

“We have arrested a man who is believed to have entered the cage, poisoned and killed the tiger,” said Henry Posma Lubis, the head of the crime unit of the Jambi Police, adding that the man, who was arrested on Friday, had been a “frequent visitor” to Jambi prison over the last several years.

The suspect was most recently detained for stealing a motorcycle, but was released on Aug. 6, Lubis said.

“It seems the suspect did almost everything, from opening the cage, climbing down and skinning the tiger, however, we believe that he was assisted by two other men and we are still looking for them,” he said, adding that the three men all came from Palembang, South Sumatra.

“We found him to be in possession of a number of items we have kept as evidence, including the knife and inex — the poison used to drug the tiger — and Rp 8 million ($792) he admitted was his commission from the Rp 26 million [earned from the sale of the tiger parts].”

Authorities suspect the killers entered the zoo by climbing through a gutter running past its lightly guarded main gate to the tiger enclosure located just 10 to 15 meters from the main road. They are then thought to have climbed onto the roof of the enclosure, from where they threw in some poisoned bait.

Lubis said the cage was not well guarded considering there was only hinge door without any padlock, but added there was no evidence that zoo staff members were involved in the crime, contrary to initial police theories.

“We believe that the three of them had planned the whole thing in prison, from finding the buyers until the execution day,” Lubis said.

He said the police were convinced that the skin and other body parts had not being distributed to illegal markets outside Sumatra island, although they suspected that they had already left the province.

At the moment, police have no intention of extending the investigation to determine whether the killing of the Sumatran tiger signaled a new trend in illegal wildlife trading.

The Jambi Natural Resources Conservation Center says there are only around 20 Sumatran tigers left in the province.