Police have released a dramatic 911 call made moments after an alligator attack that killed a 47-year-old woman while she was out walking her dogs in a Florida park.
Shizuka Matsuki, from Plantation, was dragged into a pond by the 12-foot beast in Silver Lakes Rotary Nature Park on Friday. When the animal was cut open they found a human arm.
The 911 caller tells the operator, ‘I think an alligator got this lady’, before explaining how he had been alerted to what had happened after seeing her dogs running into the parking lot, where he was standing.
Shizuka Matsuki, from Plantation, was dragged into a pond by the 12-foot beast (pictured) in Silver Lakes Rotary Nature Park on Friday
Identifying himself only as ‘Rich’, the man said he followed two of the dogs to the back of the park where he found a third dog barking alone by the water and a huge alligator. The owner, who he had seen by the water earlier, could not be found.
‘I think an alligator got this lady,’ he said. ‘Her two dogs came running out into the parking lot and I followed to the back of the park and one of her dogs was still hanging out of the water and I saw a huge alligator.
‘Two of her dogs are in the car and one of the dogs is still back by the water and the alligator is hanging out there. I saw her go in but did not see her come out.’
The caller then ran through a description of his location before the operator said she had sent an officer out.
Police were called to the pond at 9.45am, and trappers caught the alligator later that afternoon. They found an arm inside its stomach which they identified as Matsuki’s from a tattoo. The rest of her body was found in the pond at around 10pm.
Locals say the reptiles are known to frequent the water and that they know not to let their dogs off the leash there because of it.
The 12ft-long alligator was captured by trappers on Friday afternoon. Rangers found a human arm inside it which was identified as the 47-year-olds from a tattoo
Jim Borrelli, a friend of Matsuki, said on Friday that she and her husband have walked their dogs in the park previously.
After the attack that killed Matsuki, one of her dogs was found with a gash in its side.
The couple did not live in the neighborhood, but he said she liked to find different places to walk the dogs.
Borrelli said Matsuki’s husband, who is out of town and trying to fly home, sent him to the park to get more information after being contacted by Davie Police.
Borrelli said he was also asked to break the news to the couple’s son, who is in his 20s and lives in New York.
A man who identified himself as Matsuki’s brother and several other family friends gathered at the scene on Friday.
He declined to talk but friends described the missing woman as a great friend who loved to cook.
Alligators are known to become more active in the spring and early summer as temperatures heat up.
Silver Lakes is popular among dog walkers and has two large bodies of water.
One woman on social media claimed to have seen a 7ft alligator swimming in the water earlier this week.
Another woman told Local 10 that her poodle vanished near the water at Christmas and that she suspected it had been eaten.
The alligator was filmed swimming in the water at Silver Lakes Rotary Park shortly after it dragged Matsuki into the water at 9.45am on Friday
Video courtesy of Local 10
Local resident Amy Brehm told DailyMail.com that she was at the park on Wednesday night and saw the alligator in the water.
‘I was there with a friend, I go almost every day to watch the sun set.
‘While we were sitting in the gazebo an alligator swims by just off the shore. The alligator just did laps around the lake. The park ranger had just left not even five minutes before I saw it.
‘I waited around until nightfall for him to come back and tell him. I waited over an hour and he never showed so I left.
‘The park is a known park for animals to swim in. There is even a rope swing that people jump off to swim in,’ she said.
Florida Fish and Wildlife said they had received 11 calls about alligator activity in the Silver Lake Rotary Nature Park area since 2005.
Eight permits had been issued for alligator removals since 2005, but none were removed before Friday.
Search teams on Friday near to where Matsuki’s body was found at the Silver Lakes Rotary Nature Park
The most recent complaint came from a park ranger on March 26. It was about a 7-foot gator that was a threat to pets and people.
A spokesman told Dailymail.com: ‘If anybody has a concern about an alligator wherever it may be they can call our 24 hour hotline.
‘If the alligator needs to be removed – and certain criteria that has to be met is met – we can remove it at no cost.’
Fatal attacks on humans remain rare, however. According to the wildlife commission, the likelihood of a Florida resident being seriously injured during an unprovoked alligator incident in Florida is roughly only 1 in 3.2 million.
From 1948 to 2017, the commission has documented 401 people bitten by alligators, including 24 fatalities.
The most recent death occurred in 2016, when a 2-year-old boy playing near the water’s edge at a Walt Disney World resort was killed.