A woman found dead after a suspected alligator attack has been identified by authorities in Florida.
As reported by BBC News, Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that 41-year-old Sabrina Peckham was the victim of Friday's attack involving a male alligator measuring nearly 14 feet in length.
The woman - who is reported to have been homeless - was pulled from a canal in Largo after witnesses reported that the predator had a corpse in its mouth.
The authorities revealed in a statement that with the help of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), the animal was "humanely killed" and pulled from the canal.
Footage taken at the scene shows a huge alligator sprawled by the road and surrounded by police.
According to the outlet, a local witness named Jamarcus Bullard told US media that he was walking to a job interview when he spotted the vicious animal with what initially looked like a mannequin in its mouth.
"I noticed it had a body in its mouth - like a lower torso - so once I saw that I ran straight to the fire department," he said, as cited by BBC News. "It was my first time seeing a gator in real life so I was like it's pretty cool, but once I saw what it had I was like 'Is that like a mannequin?'"
"It was pale and white," he continued, telling another publication that the animal was "just clamped onto it, and swam backward to the bottom of the canal... I just couldn't believe it was real".
Bullard also told WFLA that he hurled a rock at the alligator when he saw it holding onto the lower part of the victim’s torso. The gator then yanked the body underwater.
Peckham's daughter, Breauna Dorris, wrote in a heartbreaking Facebook post that her mother was "part of the homeless population" and lived near the body of water.
"It is believed that she may have been walking to or from her campsite near the creek in the dark and the alligator attacked from the water," Ms Dorris wrote in her post. "No matter how you put it, no one deserves to die like this."
Addressing her mother, she continued: "I love you more than I ever expressed, I miss you more than you’ll ever know and I pray that you are looking down over me and your grandchildren. Please protect us."
"I’m so sorry this happened to you. I pray you are at peace and you are no longer struggling or hurting. I pray you found momo and pop and you all are watching down from above," she concluded.
The family has now created a GoFundMe page to raise money for funeral costs. As of this writing, more than $6,245 had been raised.
"We will be using the funds raised from the GoFundMe to put my mother to rest in our family plot," Dorris said on the social media platform. "My mother only being 41, we had not expected to do this anytime soon. We expected to have many many more years with her."
The cause and circumstances of Peckham’s death have not yet been confirmed.
An autopsy is expected to be carried out, and an investigation remains underway.
