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Florida police officer wrestles, relocates front porch alligator

By Ben Hooper
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July 27 (UPI) -- A Florida police officer's body camera was recording as he wrestled with an alligator on a resident's front porch to prevent it from being killed by a trapper.

The Boynton Beach Police Department posted a video to YouTube showing Officer Alfredo Vargas' body cam footage when he responded to the front porch of a home July 10 in the Hunter's Run neighborhood.

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Vargas contacted the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, which told him it would be 30 minutes before a trapper could arrive at the home, and the gator would likely be euthanized by the trapper.

Vargas, who learned about alligator handling and wrestling at the Native Village in Hollywood, was given permission by the FWC to capture and relocate the alligator himself, an option he said he preferred to having the reptile killed.

The video shows Vargas using a catch pole to restrain the alligator and taping its mouth shut.

"He put the alligator in the back seat of his patrol car and took him out to a canal by Congress Avenue and Miner Road," the police department said. "Officer Vargas removed the tape from around its mouth and put him back in the water. Officer Vargas doesn't know it yet, but we've just made him the department's official alligator wrestler (kidding but not really)."

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