Kentwood Woman Shot Video of Cincinnati Zoo Gorilla Incident

A Kentwood woman has come forward as the person who took dramatic footage of a Silverback Gorilla dragging a 4 year old child around shortly before it was shot by zoo officials in Cincinnati last weekend.

Kim O'Connor shot the video while at the Cincinnati Zoo with family Saturday afternoon. O'Connor told WLWT News she heard the boy tell his mom he wanted to jump down into the Gorilla World exhibit shortly before he did just that. She, like many who heard the comment, didn't think he would follow through.

“The little boy himself had already been talking about wanting to ... get in the water. The mother's like, 'No, you're not, no, you're not,'” O’Connor told the news outlet.

The video, which has become the main source of the incident, has received millions of views since being posted May 29. O'Connnor told MLive.com that she didn't want to put the video online at first.

"I decided it had to be released so people knew what actually happened," she told MLive. (Critics) were making it sound like the gorilla was engaging with the boy. And all those hateful things were being said online."

"The boy is looking like he's a rag doll. I saw the gorilla scale the wall with the boy and the boy's banging on the wall as he went up. He's dragging him along a cement or rock environment," she added.

She also said she transferred rights to the video to the ViralHog web site.

The gorilla was later shot by zoo officials to free the boy.