Full Body Found In Florida Gator’s Mouth

Tuesday in Lakeland, Florida, a gator was spotted with a man’s full body in its mouth. The body has not yet been identified, but Sgt. Gary Gross, the Lakeland police spokesman stated, “It appears – prematurely, a little early – that maybe this body was in the lake more than a day from looking at the body. It doesn’t appear to have just occurred.”

The man’s body and gator were found in Lake Hunter when police responded to a 911 call reporting, “I have a dead body over here in the lake. It looks like an alligator is trying to pull him down under.”

The body was then removed from the water after the gator let the body go and swam away. FWC officals later killed the 9-foot gator and plan to search the its stomach for human remains.

Sgt. Gross told NBC news that no missing persons reports in the area had recently been filed, so the discovery of the body was quite shocking to the Florida Presbyterian Homes community living alongside the lake. However, there were several reports of suspicious gator activity in the days prior to Tuesday’s 911 call. Police told ABC news, “Someone called Saturday morning to report a shirt and pants floating near the Lake Hunter Boat Ramp at 650 Sykes Blvd. The person reported finding a backpack nearby, and said an aggressive alligator had been found near the boat ramp earlier in the week.”

Police found nothing after investigating several similar reports until ultimately the gator was found with a man’s body in its mouth on Tuesday afternoon. Police plan to continue the search if no human remains are found in the gator’s stomach, but the mystery remains whether the body found was the result of a deadly alligator or if there was another cause of death.