Editorial: Attention turns back to zoo's design

AT LAST sense has prevailed ...

Charges will not be laid against the mum of the boy who fell into a gorilla enclosure at Cincinnati Zoo.

Hamilton County prosecutor Joe Deters explained that the child's mother had three other children with her, and she was attending to them when the three-year-old "just scampered off". Therefore no charges.

Everyone who is a parent - and, mindbogglingly, anyone who isn't a parent but has a brain - can see how the accident happened.

The child's mum actually deserves a medal for having the energy to take four kids on an outing to the zoo.

However, her vindication was not before family services made a visit to her home and the whole weight of social media's planet troll descended on the family.

Now the attention needs to turn to the design of the zoo, where it should have been to begin with.

Unless the parent hoisted the child over a fence or pushed him under, it's hard to see how anything but the design of the enclosure is at fault over an incident that ended with the gorilla being shot dead by staff.

And in that there was no choice - between an animal and a child, the child must always come first. Zoo staff acted quickly and correctly, and the gorilla, despite its name and home, was wild and unpredictable.

The zoo in that respect is to be applauded, but it could be the zoo that ends up paying.

It is due to reopen today, and has made changes to the surrounds. That's the least it has to do to prove it didn't endanger the life of a child, inadvertently leading to the death of one of its most precious residents.