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Miami Herald
Miami Herald
National
Carli Teproff

Cops to Florida woman: 'Do you have anything else?' She pulled a gator from her pants

MIAMI _ When a Florida deputy asked a woman if she had anything else on her during a routine traffic stop, he wasn't expecting what she did next.

She "proceeded to pull an alligator out of her yoga pants (about one foot in length) and placed it into the bed of the truck," the Charlotte County Sheriff's deputy said in an incident report.

The bizarre encounter took place at about 3:30 a.m. Monday in Punta Gorda.

Deputies were stationed on Tamiami Trail conducting traffic enforcement when they spotted a blue pickup truck that didn't stop at a stop sign, according to the incident report.

The deputy asked for the driver's license, registration and insurance card. The driver, Michael Clemons, 22, told deputies he and his passenger, Ariel Machan-Le Quire, 25, were trying to collect frogs and snakes from under the overpass.

The deputy then asked permission to search the bags in the truck to make sure "they did not collect any wildlife they were not supposed to have," the deputy wrote in the report.

Clemons consented and all of his bags had clothes and other personal items, the deputy said. Machan-Le Quire then gave permission to search her backpack, which was on the floorboard near her, according to the report.

"Ariel opened the backpack that was on the passenger's floorboard that revealed 41 small turtles," the deputy wrote in the report. Then she pulled the alligator from her pants.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission was then called to investigate. It was not immediately clear if either Clemons or Machan-Le Quire were charged.

In a funny social media post Monday, the department shared a photo of the gator in question.

"Not to be outdone by the #FloridaMan, a #FloridaWoman pulled this alligator out of her pants Monday morning during a traffic stop after being asked the standard, "Do you have anything else?"

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