When keepers arrived for work at the Alice Springs Reptile Centre they thought there had been a mass break-out. Thirteen animals, including a large turtle, bearded dragons and various lizards had apparently escaped from their outdoor pens.

Worse was the scene of carnage in the pen of Terry, an 11ft, 31-stone saltwater crocodile and the zoo’s star attraction. He had been feasting on his fellow reptiles.

CCTV footage revealed the truth: a seven-year-old boy had scaled a fence at the zoo, in Northern Territory, Australia, bludgeoned the giant lizards to death and fed them and others to the crocodile.