Florida police said they are investigating the death of a person whose body was dragged down a street and into a waterway in the jaws of an alligator.
The Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release that officers responded to a report of a dead body seen in the waterway located between 134th Avenue North and 121st Street North in Unincorporated Largo, Fla., around 1:50 p.m.
Officers discovered the remains of a deceased adult in the waterway near a 13-foot, 8.5-inch male alligator, which was eventually “humanely killed and removed from the waterway” with the help of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
The Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office said it has opened an investigation into the incident and the medical examiner’s office will perform an autopsy on the body to determine how the person died. Police have not yet released the person’s identity, and the sheriff’s office has not released other details.
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A nearby resident, JaMarcus Bullard, told Spectrum Bay News 9 he was on his way to a job interview when he saw the alligator carrying the deceased person in its jaws.
I could see his body was in his mouth, so I started filming, Bullard said.
“I picked up a rock to hit him, it was his lower torso in his mouth. It was like he swam backwards into the lower channel,” he added, according to Insider.
He told Bay News 9 he immediately “went to the fire department and reported” the incident to them, and they called 911. Bullard said he witnessed emergency personnel pull the gator out of the waterway and shoot it “several times.”
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A SkyFOX camera view from Fox 13 Tampa Bay showed several officers surrounding the large gator, which was nestled between a pool of blood and a large black police car on the road at the scene.
The dead body was found in a waterway located near Ridgecrest Park in Pinellas County, toward the outlet, which has a 5-acre lake and is known for alligator sightings. According to Bay News 9, it’s also near where a 47-year-old man died in an alligator-related incident while searching for Frisbees and other discs in the water.
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“I would never have dreamed that an alligator would be in this area,” Terri Williams told Fox 13 Tampa Bay. “Sure, I know there’s a lake across the street, and I know of a lake in Taylor Park, but not in this neighborhood. No, I never would have thought of that.”
American alligators are commonly found in freshwater lakes and slow-moving rivers and in brackish habitats, but rarely in saltwater, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.
The largest male gator observed was a 14-foot, 3 1/2-inch male from Lake Washington in Brevard County, and alligators primarily eat rough fish, snakes, turtles, small mammals, and birds.
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