SCI-TECH

Cincinnati Zoo Twitter accounts gone amid Harambe comments

Dan Sewell The Associated Press
Published Tuesday, August 23, 2016 9:51AM EDT Last Updated Tuesday, August 23, 2016 11:18AM EDT

In this May 30, 2016 file photo, Alesia Buttrey, of Cincinnati, holds a sign with a picture of the gorilla Harambe during a vigil in his honour outside the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden, in Cincinnati. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

Text:

CINCINNATI -- The Twitter accounts of an Ohio zoo targeted by online critics and trolls over the shooting of a gorilla have been taken down.

The Cincinnati Zoo has said it's not amused by the memes, online petitions and signs about Harambe, a 17-year-old great ape killed in May by a special zoo response team after a 3-year-old boy got into his enclosure. Harambe has been mourned, memorialized and satirized nearly continuously since his death.

Those seeking the Twitter sites Tuesday of the zoo or its director, Thane Maynard, got messages saying, "Sorry, that page doesn't exist!"

Maynard recently told The Associated Press by email that the zoo family is "still healing."

A zoo spokeswoman confirmed without comment Tuesday that it has deactivated its Twitter accounts.