Burmese Python

Burmese python measuring more than 8 feet long broke out of a terrarium and strangled a 2-year-old girl in her bedroom Wednesday at a central Florida home, authorities said. Shaiunna Hare was already dead when paramedics arrived at about 10 a.m., Lt. Bobby Caruthers of the Sumter County Sheriff's Office said. Charles Jason Darnell, the snake's owner and the boyfriend of Shaiunna's mother, discovered the snake missing from its terrarium and went to the girl's room, where he found it on the girl and bite marks on her head, Caruthers said.

Darnell, 32, stabbed the snake until he was able to pry the child away. "The baby's dead!" a sobbing caller from the house screamed to a 911 dispatcher in a recording. "Our stupid snake got out in the middle of the night and strangled the baby." Authorities did not identify the caller and removed the person's name from the recording. "She got out of the cage last night and got into the baby's crib and strangled her to death," the caller said. Authorities removed the snake from the home Wednesday afternoon after obtaining a search warrant. Once outside the small, tan home, bordered by cow pastures, the snake was placed in a bag then inside a dog crate. The snake was still alive.

Darnell did not have a permit for the snake, which would be a second-degree misdemeanor, said Joy Hill, a spokeswoman with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. He has not been charged, but Caruthers said investigators were looking into whether there was child neglect or if any other laws were broken. Hill said the snake will be placed with someone who has a permit, pending an investigation into the girl's death. The Humane Society of the United States said including Wednesday's death, at least 12 people have been killed in the U.S. by pet pythons since 1980, including five children. Burmese pythons are not native to Florida, but they easily survive in the state and can reach a length of 26 feet and weigh more than 200 pounds.

Karl Malden

Karl Malden played everything from priests to generals, villains to song-and-dance men over the course of a career that began in the late 1940s. The 97-year-old Oscar winner died of natural causes Wednesday at his home in Brentwood, Calif., surrounded by family including wife Mona. The couple celebrated their 70th anniversary in December. As an actor, Malden brought an Everyman quality to the screen and stage — whether playing Marlon Brando's poker buddy in A Streetcar Named Desire, Carroll Baker's cuckolded husband in Baby Doll or Gen. Omar Bradley in Patton.

The son of a Serbian father and a Czech mother, Malden was born Mladen George Sekulovich on March 12, 1912, in Chicago and raised in Gary, Ind. He worked in the steel mills before enrolling in Arkansas State Teachers College. He attended Chicago's Goodman Theatre Dramatic School, then moved to New York, where he made his Broadway debut in Golden Boy in 1937. Malden joined the innovative Group Theater, where he attracted the attention of director Elia Kazan, with whom he launched a fruitful partnership. With Kazan directing, Malden starred in such plays as Arthur Miller's All My Sons and Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, and in 1951 helped Kazan bring Streetcar to the silver screen.

Malden's film debut, however, came in 1940's They Knew What They Wanted. During his stint in the Army Air Force during World War II, Malden appeared in Winged Victory, which led to a brief contract with 20th Century Fox. One of his most memorable roles is Streetcar's Mitch, which he originated in the 1947 play. Richard Watts Jr., writing in the New York Post, described Marlon Brando's acting in the play as "an excellent piece of work," and added, "even finer is Karl Malden, one of the ablest young actors extant." He won a supporting-actor Oscar for the film adaptation. Malden would reunite with Kazan and Brando in 1954's On the Waterfront, playing a priest to Brando's longshoreman. Malden again was nominated for a supporting-actor Oscar. In 1956, Kazan cast Malden against type as the lecherous Archie Lee in Baby Doll.