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The cause of death and the identity of the body remain unknown.
By JANE MEINHARDT
© St. Petersburg Times, published August 10, 2000
LARGO -- A woman's body, mauled by alligators, was pulled from a lake behind a Largo apartment complex Wednesday.
The white, middle-aged woman wearing shorts and a white tank top had not been identified late Wednesday afternoon. A preliminary investigation had not determined how she died, said Largo police Lt. Karla Boudrot.
A resident at Penthouse Green condominiums at 225 County Club Drive noticed the body floating in the lake about noon as she looked out from her second-floor balcony.
"Based on the condition of the body, she's probably been in the water three days," Boudrot said. "We think a gator may have had the body underwater."
Most of her left leg and both of her hands were bitten off, Boudrot said.
Police didn't know if gators killed the woman or the injuries happened after her death. Adult alligators have been known to eat animals as large as deer or cattle, but fatal attacks on adult humans are rare.
Investigators were checking missing-person reports to determine if any matched the woman.
The lake is one of several across from the sixth hole at East Bay Country Club golf course and behind County Club Villas apartments.
"Yes, there are alligators in that lake and the others here," said Linda S. Hammer, whose apartment is adjacent to the north shore of the lake. "Kids who fish back in there see them all the time."
It took investigators about three hours to retrieve the body from the lake. A Largo officer with a shotgun stood guard on the shore to protect investigators and the body from alligators.
Pinellas County sheriff's deputies arrived with an inflatable boat to help firefighters with gaffs get the body ashore.
Boudrot said the lake is on property owned by Southwest Florida Water Management District, commonly known as Swiftmud. Police notified the State Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission about the incident.
"We're contacting them to ask them to come check out the gators in this lake," Boudrot said. "There are a lot of canals and lakes back in there."
Hammer said she and her family have seen alligators sunning on the banks of the small lakes near their back patio. The north shore of the square-shaped lake where the body was found is behind their apartment and hidden by dense brush and trees lining a culvert.
Children have cut a narrow pathway through the woods and marshy area to the lake. The path was partly covered by water.
"The kids fish in there all the time," Hammer said. "It's beautiful back in where the lake is. Lots of woods and wildlife."
She occasionally takes a stroll along the shoreline and through the woods and has seen people picnicking in the area. The area also is accessible via a dirt road leading off East Bay Drive near the Missing Links driving range.
"I can't believe this is happening right in our back yard," Hammer said. "The kids -- I just call them the lost boys -- play there and go back and forth on that path of theirs. That is kind of scary."