Officials raced to a public park in Largo, just 30 minutes from Tampa, to rescue the remains and investigate what happened Friday.
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JaMarcus Bullard said he was looking for fish while waiting for a job interview when he spotted the gator.
“I noticed it had a body in its mouth, like a lower torso,” he told Fox affiliate WTVT.
“So once I realized that I ran straight to the fire department and got them. They confirmed there was a body.”
At around 2pm, Florida Fish and Wildlife arrived to remove the gator from a waterway near Ridgecrest Park so they could recover the body.
The Pinellas County Medical Examiner’s Office will be conducting an autopsy to determine the individual’s identity and cause of death.
The Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that the predator had been humanely killed.
Drone footage shows the lifeless body of the dark creature being hauled into a flatbed truck by several individuals.
Friday was the first time that Bullard had seen an alligator in real life, so he remembers initially feeling lucky to see one
“But once I saw what it had I was like, “Is that a mannequin body?” he said.
“It looked pale and white.”
Bullard’s report brought a huge response from dozens of officials, including investigators who continue to look for answers.
Bullard said he was shaken after realizing the body was recovered right in front of a school and a Boys and Girls Club.
“All I can think about is all of these little kids that go to the school right behind me,” said Bullard.
“They come this way every single day.”
Another neighbor, Jennifer Dean, said people were starting to gather when they heard several gunshots ring out.
“It could have been anybody,” Dean said.
Officials are working to determine if the gator was behind the individual’s death.
The horrific discovery comes just a few months after another alligator was found with a toddler’s body in its mouth just 20 miles away.
In March, missing two-year-old Taylen Mosley’s body was found by police at Lake Maggiore.
Investigators allege the boy’s father stabbed his mother Pashun Jeffery, 20, over 100 times in their St. Petersburg apartment the day before Taylen was found.
Police confirmed the child had died of drowning.
Mosley has pleaded not guilty to two counts of first-degree murder in connection to the deaths.
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