[marktwain]

Alligators can move amazingly fast for short distances.

[mom4melody]

Shoot, shovel and shut-up....

[Joe Boucher]

Blanton, being a good old Florida boy would have 1st taken the cheeks.
Just saying.

[Carthego delenda est]

“Animal attacks are usually far less of a problem to justify than shooting a human, and for many good reasons.”

Doesn’t Florida have a “stand your ground” law? Guess that doesn’t apply to dangerous animals with more that two legs.

[jsanders2001]

I imagine he was really charged for the offense of 'defending one's property with a gun while being a white man' but they would never admit it. We now live in the Twight Zone in Obamaland. A white man is required to sit back and do nothing if attacked and should just let the attackers take whatever they want, right?

I'm glad the people in his community came to his rescue and stopped the insanity.

[jsanders2001]

< "It is another good reason to avoid shooting if there is a reasonable alternative"

If there's an animal like an alligator or a bear trying to kill you I don't think "shoo" is going to work (I hate stupid journalism when they make statements like this )

[SatinDoll]

Good thing it wasn’t a grey wolf; it is illegal to shoot one, even in self-defense or protecting your children.

[mylife]

FT FWC!

[PeterPrinciple]

The charges came from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, and may have involved a missing piece of alligator tail.

---

Missing piece of alligator tail, isn’t that the part that is good on the grill?

[aMorePerfectUnion]

Needed a rifle

[OKSooner]

"His stepson then arrived and got about eight feet away from the alligator when it suddenly attacked. “Whenever he raised up after my stepson, it looked like he was shot out of a cannon. I had never seen nothing like it...”

All of a sudden I think if I ever move to gator country I'm going to leave the 9mm on the shelf and pack some kind of 357 - a real one, not some J-frame.

That and keep a 12 gauge with slugs in the truck.

[kschockeynut87]

Simply put ... If I saw THAT on my property, I’d have shot the bloody thing too! Fish & Wildlife can come and haul it off and if they didn’t like it they can just STFU and bugger off!

[jch10]

FWC has way too much power.

[NonValueAdded]

Florida ping, please. Activism needed.

Note well the shooting itself was not the charge but rather the FWC flexing its muscle using possession of alligator parts as the charge. FLORIDIANS TAKE NOTE.

7 commissioners, next meeting Sept 8-9 in St. Augustine. Commissioners are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the state senate.

That said, Sumter County voters should take note of the judge that set a ridiculous bail and make sure that berk is retired from the bench.

[Flick Lives]

You cannot assume that you are legally in the clear, even if the local authorities have not charged you. There are thousands of statutes on the books, and more thousands (mostly federal) are added each year. It is becoming increasingly difficult to know if you are breaking the law or not.

Government is the terrorist. Keep citizens in a state of fear in their day to day existence. Everything you do is crime. That is the State's hold over you.

[ExSES]

Absolute RULE TO LIVE BY: "Shoot, Shovel and, SHUT UP!"

[ThomasMore]

We need to train alligators, crocks and pythons that liberal meat, progressive meat and democrat party meat are a delicacy. :)

[BigEdLB]

Perhaps a certain aroused FWC bureaucrat can be dropped into an area where gators feed. Charging a guy protecting his horses. Like the old lady who beat a hawk with her purse and broke its wing after it grabbed her Chihuahua and was charged. As I remember the charges were dropped cause the prosecutor didn’t think he could find a jury to convict.

[healy61]

The petitioner of the arrest warrant is much more dangerous than the alligator. He/she needs to be fired. I would guess a law officer took the tail piece, and proudly displays it in his man-cave at home.

[RandallFlagg]

Second Call Defense would have taken care of this guy.

Http://www.secondcalldefense.org

[stinkerpot65]

Same totalitarian thugs who put an old man in prison for selling an orchid:

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2009/07/the-unlikely-orchid-smuggler-a-case-study-in-overcriminalization