‘Little Joe’ The Gorilla Breaks Out Of Boston Zoo... Again

by Sherry Morse

A juvenile male gorilla broke out of the Franklin Park Zoo in Boston on September 28, in his second escape attempt since August.

The eleven-year-old, three hundred pound gorilla known as Little Joe managed to escape from the zoo only minutes before it closed for the night. While making his escape, Little Joe encountered a teenager and a toddler and injured both of them.

According to family members, Nia Scott suffered a gash on her cheek and needed several stitches, while eighteen-year-old Courtney Roberson was bitten on the back and scratched on the leg.

After roaming the zoo and nearby streets for almost two hours, Little Joe was spotted sitting at a bus stop near the zoo. The young gorilla was sedated and recaptured by zoo workers as police held back about a hundred curiosity-seekers.

Little Joe had previously escaped from the gorilla habitat in the Tropical Forest exhibit, but did not leave the exhibit grounds on that occasion.

After his earlier escape, zoo officials installed electrified wires to keep him in his habitat which also features a twelve foot wide and twelve foot deep moat.

Officials are not exactly sure how Little Joe managed to break out of his enclosure the second time.

"Needless to say, until further notice, he is not going to be on exhibit again," the Zoo New England CEO and President John Linehan remarked.

A team of gorilla experts has been called in to assess the situation.

Additional security cameras will be installed in the exhibit area and a security specialist will also be brought in to examine the exhibit and surrounding area.

The zoo has six gorillas. Young male gorillas like Little Joe pose a unique problem to zoos because of their agility and restlessness, according to Linehan.

"They go through a stage where, physically and psychologically, they’re growing much stronger, and become much more lean and long, and containment can be an increasing challenge at that age," Lineham said.

Little Joe’s desperate bids for freedom have sparked commentary in the media about the ethics of "containing" wild animals in the captive, unnatural setting of a zoo.

In an October 1 column entitled "Time to free Little Joe," Boston Globe columnist Eileen McNamara commented, "The responsible party is not the ape; it’s the humans who caged him."

"So, it turned out that a cage couldn’t hold a bored, testosterone-driven adolescent, intent on freedom," McNamara wrote. "Instead of asking why one should, we are asking how to build one that will. Seems like the wrong question."

"Want to help the gorillas and protect the residents of Seaver Street from roving teenage apes? Skip the zoo and send the $9 admission fee to the Jane Goodall Institute, the Born Free Foundation, the African Wildlife Foundation, or the International Primate Protection League, which fund sanctuaries for these animals," McNamara suggested. "Don’t lock up Little Joe. Set him free."

© 2003 Animal News Center, Inc.