Zoo officials in Cleveland say a woman was dangling her two-year-old son over a railing when he fell about 10ft (three metres) into a cheetah exhibit.

Cleveland Metroparks zoo says the toddler’s parents jumped in and pulled him to safety Saturday afternoon.

The zoo’s executive director says the cheetahs didn’t go toward the boy or his parents and that several eyewitnesses saw the woman holding the child over the railing.

Zoo officials say the boy hurt his leg in the fall. Cleveland fire department spokesman Larry Gray says the toddler was treated for bumps and bruises at a hospital.

The zoo says Cleveland Metroparks plans to seek child endangering charges against the mother.

In 2012, a similar incident at a Pittsburgh zoo left a two-year-old boy dead. The child was fatally mauled after falling into a wild African dogs exhibit.

The boy had lunged from his mother’s grasp. He fell about 10ft (three metres) from the top of a wooden railing into the enclosed exhibit below.

The boy’s parents sued the zoo, saying it had been warned about other parents who routinely lifted children on to the railing. The zoo countersued, arguing the boy’s mother was to blame for his death, because she lifted him atop the railing so he could get a better look into the exhibit.

The legal dispute was settled last year.