This sort of gruesome incident of a python eating a toddler is enough to put anyone off keeping a snake as a pet.
Personally, I've never liked reptiles. They are slimy, revolting, and scary and there is nothing cuddly or companionable about them.
The couple who were more intellectually inadequate than intentionally neglectful, in my opinion, paid the ultimate price for that stupid or macho choice of pet. They lost their beloved daughter and were punished for it with 12 years in prison.
The snake was taken in by a rescue organisation and appears to have more respect from the state than the tragic couple and their family who may never comes to terms with what happened and how they facilitated it. You could say "it serves them right" but the malice is more in the mind of the state in looking for someone to blame than it was in their mind at the time of their daughter's death. If it was my kid, I'd want to slit that damn snake's throat.
I don't know how easy it is to get an exotic pet in the UK, or if you need a licence, but it appears there is black market for it. And I wonder how the authorities can check on households with this type of pet to make sure it doesn't get hungry enough to eat their kids or is able to escape to eat the neighbour's cat
There are obviously other exotic reptiles on the loose and the very thought of it makes my skin crawl.
They say that alleged sightings of black panthers in the UK began in the late 1970s after new rules on keeping wild pets led to many being abandoned in the British countryside.
That's why I also get a bit tetchy when I hear of this kind of enterprise. The thought of just one crocodile ever being able to make a dash for freedom and then snacking on unsuspecting picnickers by the riverside somewhere nearby is too horrible to contemplate.