BOSTON -- For the second time in two months, a gorilla escaped from the Franklin Park Zoo, attacking two people before being recaptured.

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Gail Huff Reports On Gorilla Escape

"Little Joe" was on the loose for nearly two hours Sunday, roaming the streets surrounding the zoo and attacking two people before he was captured.

NewsCenter 5's Gail Huff reported that one of the victims, a 2-year-old girl, is still hospitalized. Her companion, an 18-year-old woman, was treated after being bitten on the back.

The scene outside the zoo was frightening as the 300-pound gorilla eluded officers after scaling a 10-foot-wide, 12-foot-deep moat and getting past electric wire that was erected around his exhibit. He got out of his enclosure just before the zoo was scheduled to close at 6 p.m.

Police swarmed Humboldt and Sever Streets, trying to corner the primate, which seemed oblivious to all the commotion he was causing as he drank from a discarded soda bottle and scavenged for food.

A crowd of about 100 curiosity-seekers had to be held back by officers concerned for the public's safety after the animal snatched toddler Nia Scott, 2, from her friend Courtney Roberson, 18, a zoo worker who'd taken the youngster to the zoo for an outing.

Scott's grandmother, Dale McNeil, said the gorilla grabbed the child from Roberson's arm and stomped on her, then bit at Roberson as she tried to distract him to make him stop.

"He's got an awful lot of new hormones running around in his body, combined with the fact that he's very alive, he's strong but not heavy, he's long but not heavy and yet he's full of energy, "said Zoo New England President John Linehan. Little Joe is an 11-year-old adolescent gorilla born in captivity.

Not willing to take any chances that he might attack again, the adolescent primate was shot with six tranquilizer darts, after which zoo workers were able to get a net around him and take him back to the zoo, where he's being kept in a secure holding area.

The gorilla, which escaped from the Tropical Rainforest exhibit in August, will not be on exhibit Monday, but the zoo will be open as usual. The zoo has six gorillas.