Zoo Story May Have Rocky Ending Woman Sues Walk In The Wild For Trip Over Decorative Rock At 1993 Dinosaur Exhibit

This is not the first time the zoo has been sued by injured visitors A Spokane Valley woman is suing Walk in the Wild zoo, claiming “permanent disfigurement” after she tripped over rocks during a 1993 visit.

The lawsuit, filed this week in Spokane County Superior Court, says the zoo shouldn’t have used rocks as a decoration in an indoor exhibit of robotic dinosaurs.

“While observing one of the dinosaur exhibits, Catherine Ann Morris’ foot was caught in the basalt rocks,” causing “severe physical pain,” the suit says.

Morris’ attorney, Richard Feltman, did not return telephone calls Wednesday and Thursday. Attempts to reach Morris were unsuccessful.

Former zoo employees said Morris was carrying a child when she fell in the exhibition building on Jan. 10, 1993. She apparently broke a leg.

The rocks secured a post through which rope was strung to prevent visitors from touching the life-sized dinosaurs.

The suit, which seeks unspecified damages, names Pacific Science Center Foundation as a co-defendant. That apparently is a mistake, since the Seattle-based center provided robotic dinosaurs for an earlier zoo exhibit.

Kokoro, a California company, provided robots for the show at which Morris was injured.

The financially strapped zoo closed Dec. 30. Its parent organization, Inland Northwest Zoological Society, hopes to reopen under another name at Silverwood Theme Park in North Idaho.

If Morris’ suit is successful, it will not be the first time courts have awarded money to visitors injured at the zoo.

In 1991, a Spokane County jury ordered Walk in the Wild to pay $260,000 to a boy who fell from a 30-foot cliff during a field trip four years earlier. Rick Tincani, who was 14 when he was injured, was in a coma for nearly a month and suffered partial paralysis of his right side.

, DataTimes