Live Alligator Thrown into Wendy's Drive-Thru Window in 2015
Although many crime stories border on the downright chilling and strange, there are some weird stories that crop up every so often - between fails, funnies, and criminals pulling downright dumb moves. It’s no secret that Florida has had plenty of crazy crime stories circulating in local newspapers, online outlets, and even on national news. Between different stories about being attacked by squirrels or a cop accusing a Burger King of putting dirt on his burger, Florida’s stories often make their way to the headlines first thanks to a law that makes it so that such info is easy to get access to.
Some of the motivations for these stories, crimes or other bizarre circumstances have almost seemingly no reason directing their actions, which adds to the absurdity and humor of these stories. In perhaps one of the stranger stories that made headlines in the past decade, a man was arrested for allegedly throwing an alligator into a fast food restaurant back in 2016. Although it might seem as if the prompt for this could have been some kind of anger or response against the people who were making his order, there was actually no legitimate reason for why the man chucked the gator through the window. The actual reason why the alligator was chucked through the window of Wendy’s is almost entirely unknown - and even the man himself attested it to a prank. This strange story covers this event - and some other bizarre circumstances involving gators.
Reptile Ruckus
A 23-year-old man from Florida, if asked what he did in his day, likely would not have said that he picked up an alligator on the side of a road, stopped at a Wendy’s, and chucked the animal through the drive-thru window. But on an October morning in 2015, a man fitting the previous criteria did exactly that and was later arrested for doing so. According to a crime report from Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, the man heaved the gator into a Wendy’s restaurant located in Royal Palm Beach right as an employee was handing him his drink. After that, the man turned into the back of his truck, grabbed the alligator, and chucked it into the restaurant, where it thankfully survived the dangerous throw.
The alligator itself was quite small -measuring in at only 3 feet, whereas many alligators get to a size of about 8 to 11 feet once they are fully grown. Hence, many gators that are found involved in these types of crimes are quite young. And although no one was hit by the alligator or attacked or hurt, the man was arrested and taken into custody. A later trial showed that the man’s “stupid prank” had resulted in him getting a light slap on the wrist, with probation and an order to stay away from the fast-food restaurant. But this isn’t the first time a reptile has ended up at a fast-food joint - an alligator ended up at a Texas McDonald’s late at night in a more bizarre incident that had happened a few years prior.
Another Florida man was arrested for attempting to use a 4-foot alligator - not much larger than the alligator chucked through the Wendy’s - as a tender for a six-pack at a gas station. When attempting to barter with the cashier for the gator, the clerk instead called the cops - resulting in a strange arrest case. And another alligator wanted to stop by a Florida Walmart, possibly to pick up some things, but instead stayed away from and freaking out people - because alligators just don’t stop that often at Walmart. Despite all these strange instances of reptiles causing chaos, the man who chucked the alligator through the window was probably the strangest. There’s probably no doubt that all of these strange instances have led to people trying to make smarter decisions.
Although the court and the judge disagreed, the man believed that his “stupid prank” had made him think and he promised that he’d learned his lesson. As for the man who tried to buy beer with an alligator - there was nothing that came of that case, and no further reports on the court case were put in the news, likely due to a lack of interesting material to report. Hopefully, these people won’t be continuing to chuck alligators through windows of fast-food establishments, but thanks to this weird chain of gator incidents - most of which involve strange or bizarre crimes - the gators are involved in a lot of news, both crime-related and not.
In fact, alligators have been a pretty big problem in the southern states, especially Florida, for both being seen outside their habitat, attacking people, and having dwindling populations - and the man having said he picked up an alligator on the side of the road is a clear indication on that. Florida has laws in place that forbid the unlawful transportation and possession of alligators specifically because of incidents like these and also a rising amount of gators being sighted in the streets - and without these laws, an incident like this one probably would have been passed off as a “stupid prank”. However, thanks to dwindling gator populations, there are some serious consequences that come from mishandling an alligator - especially in a place like Florida.
The incident in which a man from Florida chucked a gator through the window of a Wendy’s did ultimately net him a ban from the restaurant and a slap on the wrist with probation, but more than anything else, it brought a lot of confusion to the internet, hence the story being so viral and laughed at. It’s the earliest in a string of “Florida Man” stories that made headlines for bizarre circumstances in which people from the state were getting involved in weird and crazy situations - and now the gators are a part of that strange legacy as well. Hopefully, there won’t be any situations in the future where people continue to try taking animals and chucking them into buildings - let alone fast food places.