23-Foot Python Kills Worker

A 23-foot python squeezed a rubber plantation worker to death and tried to swallow him, officials said today.

It was the longest python ever sighted in Malaysia, said zoologist Khiew Bong Heng of the University of Malaya.

E. Heng Chuan, 29, had gone into the woods behind his home when he was attacked by the python, district police chief Mohamed Mokhtar Ahmad said.

The python was shot and killed by police, whom the victim’s brother summoned. It had already swallowed the victim’s head and crushed some of his bones. The python weighed 308 pounds and was 10 inches in diameter.