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13

Last but in Fact Most Importantly … Health and Safety
Tim Sullivan

13.1 Introduction I thought ‘Why should I subject myself to this
when I don’t even work for this zoo?’ The
It has been many years since a phone call for- answer came to me when I learned something
ever changed my perspective on animal very important; information that made this
training. Until that call, I had spent my entire event relevant to me and everyone else in this
career honing my knowledge and skills to field. As a result of this accident and the sub-
train zoo animals. Several years earlier, my sequent lawsuit, the zoo in question had tem-
job had changed from training animals to porarily prohibited all animal husbandry
training the keepers at my zoo to do the training. The lawsuit and an Occupational
same. I enjoyed this challenge because I knew Health and Safety Administration (OSHA)
that my efforts would now have a broader investigation forced the zoo to examine the
effect in enhancing the care of our animals. risks that animal training brought to their
I answered the phone and the caller identi- keepers and their business in general.
fied himself as an attorney whose firm was It was clear to me that a negative finding in
representing a major zoo. A keeper at this either the lawsuit or OSHA investigation could
zoo had suffered a traumatic injury during a have a terrible ripple effect across the entire
training session with a large carnivore. A civil zoo community. In today’s litigious society,
lawsuit had been filed against the zoo and strict government regulations and pressures of
I was being asked to provide testimony for rising insurance rates, a single employee or
the zoo as an expert witness. I found myself employer operating in an unsafe manner can
immediately conflicted, I felt terrible for the jeopardise everyone’s ability to use animal
keeper that had been injured but I had training to enhance animal welfare. We must
learned enough about the incident to know all develop and maintain a culture of safety in
that the zoo was not necessarily at fault for the workplace, especially during animal train-
what happened. I asked the attorney if I could ing when we are brought in close proximity to
have a few days to consider this request and potentially dangerous animals.
he kindly agreed. I did become an expert witness in the above
I had seen my fair share of TV court dramas case and spent the coming year sifting
where the expert witness is subjected to bru- through the facts of this case. I studied animal
tal cross‐examination. I was not thrilled about training records, staff training documents
the possibility of being on the receiving end and safety policies and procedures. I viewed
of an interrogation thoughtfully designed deposition videos from all the witnesses
to undermine my expertise and character. involved in the case. It was an enlightening

Zoo Animal Learning and Training, First Edition. Edited by Vicky A. Melfi, Nicole R. Dorey, and Samantha J. Ward.
© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Published 2020 by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.