I may be unique in my thought here, but it shouldn’t matter if they were taunting the animal or not.
If that animal got out of its enclosure on its own then there is a problem with the enclosure and the zoo should be held responsible.
When you walk into a zoo, you should have the reasonable expectation of being able to walk away unmauled, even if there is someone teasing an animal.
Nah. You aren’t alone. Mr. Brightside should be in here soon. He doesn’t subscribe to Darwin’s Law in this case either.
Well, you are not alone.
Who cares if they were taunting an animal?
I certainly don’t!
If they were in the wilds of Africa then that would be different, but this was a ZOO, for Christ’s sake!
I agree. You see it all the time in zoos. People want to see the animal get up and move around. And I don’t care how stupid the kids might have been, it was the zoos responsibility to keep the animal secure under any circumstamce.
I’ve said the following many times on many threads. Let me run this by you...
...you’re right. The damn tigers should be confined to their enclosures no matter what’s going on in the outside world.
But these fine, fine fellows whose parents must be so damn proud of them, taunted the tiger and scuttlebutt has it that one of them was leaning over into the tiger’s enclosure so far that when the tiger sprung to attack the tormenters it actually used this guy as a human ladder to get out of the pit.
Now...Mark Geragos is one sweet and noble man and no doubt he’s representing those boys out of the goodness of his heart and expects no recompense. But some suspect that these young men intend to SUE the zoo and perhaps Geragos might get some of the dough.
One young man died as a result of his idiocy and another was injured. They had a good scare and hopefully learned a lesson. One magnificent animal is dead that should be alive and happy as we type.
Perhaps it would be best if these boys didn’t get a huge financial reward for their bad behavior and don’t forget the very odd combination of a wall scaled by a tiger with a little help from a human body that shouldn’t, oughta hadda been there.
Hardly like those innocents were walking by the tiger enclosure minding their own business when a big beast jumped out at them and attacked them.
Thus it’s necessary, in terms of a CIVIL suit more than a criminal suit in this matter, to ascertain if perhaps those boys might have bought some of their misery on themselves.
The San Fran zoo is very badly run with a zoo director pulling in 300K a year for doing essentially nothing. The wall enclosing the tiger was not high enough although there’s that human ladder thing. For sure the zoo wasn’t without blame.
But those boys do not deserve to become millionaires, not to mention Geragos who is known world wide as a fine humanitarian and we know he won’t ask but for a small pittance for his clients’ trouble. One boy is dead and they paid a price for their bad behavior.
Now do they, and the very fine and personable Mark Geragos, really deserve to become millionaires for what they did?
Finally, what does the beautiful but dead Tatiana get?
I agree, the animal was a threat to others at the zoo as well. When you design for safety, you have to take into account what I call "the moron factor", especially when the moron will put others at risk.
Exactly. It is the zoo’s responsibility to ensure that the animals cannot escape its confinement, no matter what. There will always be idiots among the visitor crowd.
As an aside, I had been to the Singapore Night Safari / Zoo a few months ago, and they have a fence/cage -free moat system separating the animals from the visitors.
IMHO, the confinements of the the hyenas and the tigers are a disaster waiting to happen.
These animals get taunted every day. How many fathers have put their little one on the railing so they can see better.
It will be. Perhaps they can mitigate the settlement somewhat by showing contributory negligence on the behalf of the victim(s).
what he did was stupid, and while stupidity shouldn't necessarily be fatal it should also not be rewarded. Next you will have people falling in front of a Mack truck, and then claiming that the local Government should have built guard rails to prevent people from tripping and falling in front of rolling juggernauts!
In my book those kids qualify for a Darwin award, and while the Zoo should be penalized that money shouldn't go to the survivor and his lawyer. Sad thing is that he was also not mauled in the event .....the tiger should have been more efficient in dispatching those sots.
>>I may be unique in my thought here, but it shouldn’t matter if they were taunting the animal or not.
If that animal got out of its enclosure on its own then there is a problem with the enclosure and the zoo should be held responsible.
When you walk into a zoo, you should have the reasonable expectation of being able to walk away unmauled, even if there is someone teasing an animal.<<
that was the conclusion of the Fox legal analysts.
I’m more in agreement with the Harry Potter line of thinking - that if you taunt a snake and wind up, even if by magic, in with the snake then you got what you deserved.
The Fox lawyers, though said that even a mitigating negligence by the visitor does not overcome the obvious negligence by the zoo and that the city would be writing a big check.