Shaquille O'Neal Responds to Cameo in 'Tiger King'

Former Laker Shaquille O'Neal had a cameo in Netflix's wildly popular series "Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness," a seven-part docuseries that focuses on Joseph Allen Maldonado-Passage.

Maldonado-Passage is serving 22 years in federal prison after being convicted on 17 federal charges of animal abuse and two counts of murder for hire.

In the first episode, O'Neal took photos alongside the animals at Maldonado-Passage's zoo, the Greater Wynnewood Exotic Animal Park in Oklahoma.

O'Neal said on The Big Podcast With Shaq that while he was on "the Shaq bus" in Oklahoma, he saw a sign for a "tiger sanctuary" and decided to check it out.

"We went back a couple times," O'Neal said on the podcast. "Then we go back another time and we found out that he's involved with all the stuff and then, actually, I stopped going. I had no idea all that stuff was going on."

O'Neal said he binge-watched the docuseries and was unaware at the time of what was happening behind the scenes. He called himself an animal lover and brought up his cameo on the podcast to "clear myself right now."

"Don't know him," O'Neal said. "Never had any business dealings with him and I had no idea any of that stuff was going on."

O'Neal, who won three championships with the Lakers in 2000, 2001 and 2002, said he's not worried that his brief appearance on the show will cast him in a bad light.

"People that know me, they know I'm righteous," O'Neal said. "I don't harm tigers. I love tigers. I love white tigers. Do I put donations to these zoos to help these tigers out? I do it all the time."

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