Michelle Gregg: Woman Who Knows Mother Of Boy Who Slipped Into Gorilla’s Enclosure Comes To Her Defense

Michelle Gregg is catching heat while the internet is ablaze with fury over the killing of Harambe the Gorilla after her 4-year-old son slipped into his enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo on Saturday.

A parent by the name of Airy knows Gregg and is defending her as a mother. Airy’s children attend Little Blossoms Academy, where Gregg is an administrator. Airy calls Gregg a “good woman” and “really caring.”

“I really feel bad for her and what happened,” Airy tells People magazine.

Gregg is the subject of polarizing national debate after her child managed to get inside a 450-pound gorilla’s enclosure after he told her he wanted to swim with the animal. As the Inquisitr reported earlier, the eyewitness who recorded the incident observed Gregg being distracted with several other children she had with her at the zoo when the little boy sneaked away. Commotion from zoo visitors started after they spotted a 4-year-old in the gorilla exhibition, which Michelle Gregg saw right away that it was her son, Isaiah.

Cincinnati parent defends mother of 4-year-old who fell into gorilla enclosure https://t.co/CqAQvGeL0A pic.twitter.com/AleAIBFF4g

— People Magazine (@people) June 1, 2016

Harambe was killed during Isaiah’s rescue, and it has since ignited a public outcry against Gregg and the boy’s father. Many are launching petitions to criminally prosecute the mother for negligence leading to the death of Harambe.

Michelle Gregg works as site manager at the childcare facility, and Airy disagrees with the protesters.

“All the negativity I see online – that’s not her,” she said. “She’s not a neglectful woman. She’s caring. It’s not about her not paying attention or not caring. Things happen.”

This parent defending the boy’s mother after he got inside Harambe’s enclosure says she’s comfortable with Gregg taking care of her kids.

“She takes good care of my kids. It’s the best daycare I’ve had,” Airy says.

According to a press release from Little Blossoms Academy, Gregg spent Tuesday at home caring for her son’s injuries after Saturday’s incident.

A representative told People on Tuesday that the family is “not making any statements, and they don’t anticipate making any statements in the future. They’re just trying to keep their lives as normal as possible.”

Time published an article in its Parenting section titled, “Stop Mommy-Shaming Over the Gorilla Incident.” The article reflected on society’s views of parenting and how they react when something unfortunate happens.

“Parent shaming is all about reverse-engineering a moment,” author Jeffrey Kluger, a father, writes. “A bad thing happened; parents are supposed to prevent bad things from happening; therefore a parent must be to blame. A child would certainly never fall into a gorilla enclosure on my watch.”

“Stop mommy-shaming the gorilla boy’s mom” https://t.co/w7aKQnXk6W

— TIME.com (@TIME) June 1, 2016

Kluger added in his commentary that children “don’t play by those kinds of rules” and they’re “drawn irresistibly to the most dangerous things in their environment.” He continues that controlling a single child is a “process of quick reflexes and constant vigilance; wrangling several of them—as Gregg was reportedly doing at the precise moment her son slipped away from her—is exponentially harder.”

The mommy-shaming piece is concluded with the writer pointing out that there are “tiny cracks in time in which accidents happen—the millisecond before and after a child falls in a museum or tumbles into an animal enclosure—are sometimes impossible to foresee.”

In Michelle Gregg’s case, she’s being skewered relentlessly by the world after the western lowlands silverback gorilla — an endangered species — was shot and killed out of fear he’d do serious harm to the child.

The public doesn’t know Michelle Gregg or the circumstances surrounding what happened to her the day her son slipped into the gorilla’s enclosure, but many are adamant she’s responsible for what happened.

[Photo Credit: Justice for Harambe Facebook]