Zoologist accused of assault tells of cloakroom confrontation with love rival

Caroline Westlake, 30, who worked with the meerkats, was convicted Friday of assault for smashing her colleague Kate Sanders in the cheek with a wine glass, The Guardian reports.

Westlake continued: “She (Ms Sanders) said “Caroline, I want to apologise for what you heard me saying earlier in the bathrooms”, and then I remember saying “why did you say it?”

Miss Westlake claimed that it was an accident, and that Miss Sanders had already punched her, held her backwards over a 30 ft balcony and then spat at her.

Westlake had been seeing Mr Davies for a year at the time, and he had previously had a five-year relationship with Ms Sanders.

Nearly immediately afterwards, Mr Davies asked Miss Westlake for a date – but she turned him down because she didn’t want to be his “rebound”.

He then dated a woman who worked in the gift shop for four months and pursued Miss Westlake once again after they broke up.

The feud came to a head during the staff Christmas party at the zoo’s Prince Albert Suite on December 8 past year.

A former London Zoo zoologist has been found guilty of glassing the ex-girlfriend of her llama-keeper lover during a Christmas party fight.

The pair started arguing and Miss Sanders screamed: “Nobody likes you – everyone thinks you’re mad”, while Miss Westlake responded: ‘Everyone thinks the same about you’.

A meerkat expert glassed a monkey handler in a row at the London Zoo Christmas party over a love triangle involving a llama keeper, a court heard today.

The argument escalated, Westlake said.

The bench at Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard Ms Sanders had a history of hitting people, including Mr Davies himself.

Sanders, of north London, was given a final warning and banned from Zoological Society of London events for two years as a result of the fight.

Giving evidence in court, Miss Sanders sobbed as she spoke of her shock when blood “came pouring out” of her mouth. And then it was like a split second struggle and I was standing apart from her and I remember seeing her face was cut, and I remember thinking: “‘How has this happened?'”.

“Things were being said on both sides that shouldn’t have been said”, Miss Sanders told the court. I was extremely shocked when it hit me.

“She punched me in the side of my face”. I am trying to be nice, trying to be civil, I don’t understand what I have done wrong to you’.

“It knocked me back”.

Miss Sanders who worked on the “Mammals south” section of the zoo insisted she was “mortified” that Miss Westlake had overheard the comment and said she was anxious about it all evening until they met at the cloakroom as she picked up her coat.

Miss Westlake then appeared from one of the cubicles, but the alleged victim said she had no idea she was in the bathroom at the time.

Sanders said that she needed stitches to close a wound after being assaulted by Westlake.

She said: ‘I took the bandages off for my brother’s wedding but the pictures I uploaded were very selective’.

Speaking outside court, her lawyer Suzanne Kelly said: “The bench found the charges proven”.

“That is definitely not true”. She was just chatting to me more than normal.

“She may have got those injuries at work, we do a very physical job”.

She admitted seeing him kiss another woman at a previous Christmas party but denied following him into the toilets screaming and crying on that occasion.