Child crushed by python, autopsy shows

OXFORD, Fla., July 3 (UPI) -- An autopsy revealed a Florida toddler died of asphyxiation after she was constricted and bitten by the family's pet Burmese python.

Police said Shaiunna Hare, 2, was in her crib Wednesday when the 8-foot, 6-inch python escaped its pen and entered her room at her Oxford, Fla., home, the St. Petersburg Times reported. The snake repeatedly bit her and squeezed her to death before her mother's boyfriend, Charles Darnell, awoke and found the snake missing.

Deputies said Darnell reported the child was strangled by the reptile, and that he extricated the girl by stabbing the snake with a knife and meat cleaver.

"The autopsy was only done this morning, and there's still some additional investigation to be done," Paul Magrino, a homicide prosecutor for the Sumter County attorney's office, said Thursday. "Generally speaking, whenever you have the death of a small child in a home under circumstances that demonstrate something other than natural causes, it certainly has to be investigated."

The Sumter County Sheriff's Office and Department of Children and Families are investigating. The python and a 6-foot boa constrictor were removed from the house. The python was treated at a veterinary hospital and was being held for evidence, the Times reported Thursday.

The Department of Children and Families removed two other children from the home, DCF spokeswoman Carrie Hoeppner said.