By Theodore Bunker | Tuesday, March 31, 2026
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal from Joseph Maldonado-Passage, the exotic animal breeder known as “Joe Exotic” and “Tiger King,” leaving intact his federal conviction and 21-year prison sentence in a murder-for-hire case tied to his long-running feud with animal rights activist Carole Baskin.
The ruling closes Maldonado-Passage’s latest bid to overturn a case that made him one of the most recognizable criminal defendants in the country after Netflix’s 2020 documentary series “Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness” turned his Oklahoma zoo empire and personal rivalry with Baskin into a pop culture phenomenon.
Court records show the petition was denied March 30 in case No. 25-1025, and the justices did not explain their decision. Maldonado-Passage, 63, was convicted by an Oklahoma jury in 2019 on two counts tied to separate murder-for-hire schemes targeting Baskin, along with multiple wildlife-related offenses involving the sale of tiger cubs, the killing of tigers, and falsified records.
Prosecutors stated his obsession with Baskin intensified as their public feud escalated over his treatment of big cats and his roadside zoo business. He was originally sentenced to 22 years in prison; however, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit later upheld the conviction, finding that the trial court improperly treated the two murder-for-hire counts separately at sentencing.
That ruling sent the case back for resentencing, and a federal judge in 2022 reduced the sentence by one year to 21 years. At that 2022 hearing, Maldonado-Passage asked the court for leniency, saying, “Please don’t make me die in prison waiting for a chance to be free.” The judge rejected his request.
The Supreme Court petition was filed in February after the 10th Circuit entered judgment in a later appeal and denied a rehearing in October 2025. Maldonado-Passage is incarcerated at the Federal Medical Center in Fort Worth, Texas, where he has claimed to be battling prostate cancer. His lawyers argued that witness testimony was unreliable and that the killing of several tigers was medically necessary; however, lower courts left the jury’s verdict intact.
The denial underscores how rarely the Supreme Court intervenes in criminal appeals after lower courts have affirmed convictions. For Maldonado-Passage, whose notoriety grew far beyond the courtroom, the legal result is straightforward: His conviction stands, and his 21-year federal sentence remains in effect.
