These are
the parents of the four-year-old boy whose 15-feet fall into the gorilla
exhibit moat in Cincinnati Zoo resulted in the death of 17-year-old
silverback gorilla, Harambe.
Seen
here for the first time is mother
Michelle Gregg, 32, who has four
children by father Deonne Dickerson, 36, a man who, Daily Mail Online
can disclose, has a lengthy criminal history.
Criminal
filings against Dickerson stretch over a decade and include burglary,
firearms offences, drug trafficking, criminal trespass, disorderly
conduct and kidnap.
In 2006 he was sentenced to one year behind bars for a drug trafficking conviction.
But
in numerous pictures posted on Dickerson's Facebook site in recent
years he appears to have turned his life around to become the proud
father of four.
Indeed, the majority of his postings to the social media site are updates of his children and his working life.
In others pictures he has uploaded his friends congratulate him and Michelle on the birth of their fourth child last January.
Together: Michelle Gregg and Deonne Dickerson at home
Cleveland
based Dickerson is from Atlanta, Georgia and studied at Cuyahoga
Community College, Ohio and now works as a sorter at a Cincinnati
industrial equipment supplier.
Gregg is currently the administrator at a Cincinnati pre-school.
She
has been the subject of sharp criticism following the incident that saw
zoo staff shoot dead Harambe who, according to new video footage, may
have been protecting rather than threatening the child after he crawled
through a barrier and fell into the gorilla's enclosure.
Many social media commenters have criticized her and Dickerson and said they should be held accountable.
A
Cincinnati police spokesman said no charges were being considered. A
spokeswoman for the family said on Monday they had no plans to comment.
'I
do think there's a degree of responsibility they have to be held to,'
said Kate Villanueva, a mother of two children from Erlanger, Kentucky,
who started the 'Justice for Harambe' page and attended a vigil on
Monday at Cincinnati Zoo for Harambe.
'You have to be watching your children at all times.'
More
outraged animal lovers took to social media declaring the western
lowland gorilla's life was unnecessarily taken, and more than 290,000
have already joined 'Justice for Harambe' which place the blame squarely
on the boy's parents.
Ian
Redmond, the chairman of the Gorilla Organization, told CNN : 'When
gorilla or other apes have things they shouldn't have, keepers will
negotiate with them, bring food, their favorite treats, pineapple or
some kind of fruit that they don't know and negotiate with them.'
Primatologist
Julia Gallucci said: 'The gorilla enclosure should have been surrounded
by a secondary barrier between the humans and the animals to prevent
exactly this type of incident.'
Source: Dailymail
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