Zoo admits guilt over girl mauled to death in tiger attack
A ZOO yesterday admitted failing to ensure a door through which a tiger escaped and mauled a Scots keeper to death was working properly.
Sarah McClay was pounced on by a Sumatran tiger named Padang as she cleaned its enclosure at South Lakes Wild Animal Park in 2013.
The zoo’s owner David Gill afterwards blamed the tragedy on ‘keeper error’, saying the 24-yearold, from Glasgow, had made a ‘tragic mistake’.
Yesterday, however, the zoo – where he remains the sole director – admitted health and safety breaches over the fatal accident, and now faces a hefty fine.
It accepted that a ‘more proactive maintenance and inspection regime should have been in place’ on the self-closing mechanism of the door through which the tiger escaped.
Afterwards, the victim’s mother, Fiona McClay, from Linlithgow, West Lothian, said she was ‘angry’ that it had taken three years for the zoo to finally admit her daughter’s death was preventable.
‘I think the investigation and the evidence have shown that it was not the tiger’s fault, it was not Sarah’s fault, it was the zoo’s fault,’ she told the Daily Mail. ‘I want to know now that the safety at the zoo is suitable for staff and visitors, so this could not happen again.’
Paying tribute to her daughter’s love of animals, the 52-year-old community support worker, said: ‘It was her dream job and that is no exaggeration.
‘She would never have blamed the tiger for what happened, because it was a wild animal. She would not have wanted the tiger to be put down.’
Miss McClay’s boyfriend, David Shaw, added: ‘It’s a shame it took this long to come to what was a fairly obvious conclusion but I am pleased we do not have to go through a trial.’
Earlier this year warnings that visitors to the zoo in Dalton-inFurness, Cumbria – now known as South Lakes Safari Zoo – were at risk from animals prompted the local council to threaten to withdraw its licence.
It said baboons could potentially escape their enclosure by scrambling up piles of rhino dung and said too many visitors had been bitten by animals.
Working with tigers at the park had been Miss McClay’s ‘dream job’ ever since she visited aged six, according to her family.
But after working there for two years, in May 2013 she was in a corridor outside the tiger house when she was attacked, suffering ‘unsurvivable’ multiple injuries.
Even before an official inquiry had begun, Mr Gill blamed ‘keeper error’, saying Miss McClay had committed a ‘sad error of judgment’. Her brother Stephen at the time said Mr Gill’s comments were ‘ill-advised, premature and disrespectful’, and accused him of having an ‘axe to grind’.
The following year an inquest jury ruled that the tiger had passed through two open internal sliding gates within the tiger house and then an open door that led to the corridor. The inquest heard that a bolt on the self-closing door to the ‘dark den’ was defective, meaning it stayed ajar instead of locking.
At Preston Crown Court yesterday the zoo admitted failing to ensure the health, safety and welfare at work of employees, including Miss McClay, relating to the keeping of big cats. It also pleaded guilty to a second count of failing to ensure that persons not in its employment were not exposed to risk to their health and safety.
The court was given a ‘basis of plea’ in which the zoo accepted its risk assessment of the dark den door had been insufficient.
Accepting that ‘a more proactive maintenance and inspection regime’ should have been in place, it added: ‘The failure of the door to self-close was a more than trivial cause of harm.’
The prosecution offered no evidence against 55-year-old Mr Gill, who faced individual charges on the same allegations and formal not guilty verdicts were recorded against him.
The prosecution case was brought by Barrow Borough Council, which licenses the park and in January threatened to withdraw its licence.
At the time, the zoo accused the council of harassment and said it would close permanently, but later agreed to make the required changes and stay open.
The court was told the zoo – which made an operating profit of £567,000 last year – will be sentenced tomorrow.
Mr Gill, of Dalton-in-Furness, made no comment as he left court.
It can now be reported that earlier this year the zoo admitted two other contraventions of the Health and Safety at Work Act when a zookeeper fell from a ladder while preparing to feed big cats in 2014.
Miss McClay’s family are now considering civil action against the zoo.
In March, the zoo announced the death of Padang from old age.
‘This was her dream job’ ‘Ill-advised and disrespectful’