Sam Jones: 'For holding a baby wombat, thousands threatened my life'

Sam Jones says she was trying to get the wombat safely off the road, and the video was not staged for social media.

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Sam Jones, who calls herself an "outdoor enthusiast and hunter", was filmed picking up the joey on the side of a road, while laughing and running over to a car, while the mother chases after them.

It sparked a huge backlash, with Australian PM Anthony Albanese challenging her to "take a baby crocodile from its mother and see how you go there".

In a lengthy statement on her Instagram page, Jones says she was trying to get the animals safely off the road.

She said, as can be seen in the video, that the mother runs off the road, but the baby does not, and Jones scoops it up. She says she ran across the road "not to rip the joey away from its mother, but from fear she might attack me".

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cm2d1x4ykvgo

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