Ken and his wife were woken up last weekend in Colorado's mountain town of Steamboat Springs, where their three children were sleeping on the floor below. She said there was a bear in the house.
The couple's barking dogs did not wake up their husband before dawn on Saturday. She walked to the door of the couple's bedroom and saw a 400 pound black bear in the dining room.
Ken Mauldin said in an interview that he took his wife's place at the door and shot at the bear. He believes the first shot hit the bear and charged him as he was being fired at.
The bear turned toward the stairs leading to the home's front door as he was shooting at it. The bear crashed through the bannister as Mauldin emptied the gun.
The couple didn't know it at the time, but officials think the bear got into their home by pushing the door handle down.
He didn't think the bear would get back up after it was shot, as it lay breathing and heaving between him and his sons on the lower floor. He told his son to stay in his room after he called the emergency services.
The only thing that came to my mind was protecting my family.
A bag of dog food was moved by the bear. The bear was dead when police and wildlife officers arrived. A Colorado Parks and Wildlife officer said that they used a winch to pull it into a truck.
He said that the bear was a big one.
About 12,000 bears and break-ins aren't uncommon in Colorado, but homeowners shooting bears in their homes is rare. People can shoot bears if they feel threatened.
There are many bears in the mountain area because of its environment, which includes a river, oak brush and vegetation that they eat.
Other homeowners had reported bear break-ins before the bear opened the door to the Maudlin's home. The front door was left unlocked while the family did a nightly check to close windows.
There is no way to know if the same bear broke into the Mauldin family's home. Pollock said black bears will return once they realize food is behind a window or in a bird feeders.
The bears are very smart. They will keep doing it once they know that it is easy to get food in a certain area.
Pollock said that the bear's hide and meat will be donated to people who have signed up on a list to receive them and that the bear's head will be auctioned off.
The break-in at his home may prompt something good from something terrible that happened.
"We are in a situation where we have town bears that are no longer afraid of humans." That is what we have to address, in my opinion.
That's right.
Jesse Bedayn is a corps member for the AP. A program called Report for America places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. You can follow Bedayn on the social networking site.
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