A 56-year-old Florida man found dead in a pond was killed by a 300-pound alligator, a county medical examiner has ruled.
Don Owen of Bartow was found floating in the South Lakeland pond last Saturday. He suffered injuries in the alligator attack and subsequently drowned, the Lakeland Ledger reported Wednesday.
Authorities captured the reptile and destroyed it Monday.
It was not clear what Owen was doing at the pond and how the alligator got him. He was last seen March 9 in a disoriented state, his family told the sheriff's office.
Owen asked a passer-by to make a telephone call to an unidentified friend for him that morning, but as the man placed the call, Owen got back in his vehicle and drove off, said his brother, the Rev. Eddie Owen of First Christian Church in Bartow. That evening he was seen at a convenience store near the pond.
Owen was a truck driver for McDonald Construction Corp., and a devoted family man, his brother said.
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