Trappers Say They Caught Killer Gator

Wildlife officers captured an alligator that they believe fatally attacked a woman while she snorkeled in a secluded recreation area.

Trappers caught the 11-foot-4-inch, 407-pound, alligator on a baited hook Thursday near Lake George, where Annemarie Campbell was attacked, state wildlife officials said.

"I think it's a great relief because my experience of alligators is that, once they kill, they kill again, and I don't want someone else to go through what I went through," the woman's mother, Dawn Marie Yankeelov of Louisville, Kentucky, told the Ocala Star-Banner for Friday's editions.

A forensic tooth expert has to confirm that the bite marks on Campbell match the gator's teeth, said Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission spokeswoman Kat Kelley.

People with Campbell beat the animal until it released her body. She was found in the mouth of the alligator, WKMG-TV, a Florida CBS affiliate reported. The captured alligator bore scratch marks on its snout and a stab wound in its right eyelid, officials said.

Campell, 23, of Paris, Tennessee, died from drowning and multiple blunt-force injuries, according to an autopsy.

Trappers told WKMG-TV that given the size of the alligator, Campbell did not have a chance.

"She would not have had any chance," trapper Curtis Lucas told WKMG-TV. "I mean in the water, he has all of the advantage. That is his home ground. He was made to operate and move in the water. She had no chance."

Juniper Run in the Ocala National Forest has been closed since the fatal attack, WKMG-TV reports, but U.S. Forestry officials said the area will be reopened to swimmers after the alligators are examined.

"We do believe it is safe," U.S. Forest Service representative Denise Rains told WKMG-TV. "Any body of water in Florida has the potential to have alligators in it. People need to be aware of that any time they are in the National Forest. But it is as safe today as it was yesterday."

Campbell's death was the third fatal alligator attack in Florida this month. The state had 17 confirmed fatal attacks by the animals in the previous 58 years.