(LARGO, Fla.) — A Florida man killed in a suspected alligator attack was likely looking for Frisbees in a lake, authorities said.

The Largo Police Department said Tuesday it is investigating the death of a man at Taylor Lake in Largo, a city in the Tampa Bay area.

“At this time, detectives believe the victim was looking for Frisbees in the water and a gator was involved,” the department said in a statement.

The man was found along the shoreline by a bystander walking their dog in Taylor Park, home to a 53-acre freshwater lake, and police were contacted around 8 a.m. Tuesday, according to Largo Police Department spokesperson Megan Santo.

Police identified the victim Wednesday as 47-year-old Sean Thomas McGuinness. Investigators believe he was looking for Frisbees in the water at night when an alligator likely attacked him.

“According to Park Management, McGuinness was known to frequent the park and enter the lake with disregard to the posted ‘No Swimming’ signs,” the department said in a statement. “A witness also advised detectives that McGuinness was known to sell discs back to people within the park as the park is equipped with a disc golf course and McGuinness was found within a few feet of a disc in the water.”

The medical examiner will determine the exact cause of death, though it was apparent from the injuries that alligators were involved, police said.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission responded to the scene Tuesday.

“A contracted nuisance alligator trapper is working to remove a nearby alligator and efforts will be made to determine if it was involved in this situation,” the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said in a statement Tuesday.

Police urged residents and visitors to avoid going near or swimming in the lake at any time. There are “no swimming” signs posted at the lake, according to police.

Fatal alligator bites are rare. From 1948 to 2021, Florida reported 442 unprovoked bite incidents from alligators, 26 of which resulted in fatalities, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. In the last 10 years, the state has averaged eight unprovoked bites a year that require medical treatment, the agency said.

The likelihood of someone being seriously injured during an unprovoked alligator incident in Florida is roughly one in 3.1 million, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

The last fatal alligator attack in Florida was in 2019, according to the agency.

A man was bitten in the face by an alligator at Taylor Park in 2020 while looking for frisbees in the lake, ABC News Tampa affiliate WFTS reported at the time. The injury was non-life-threatening.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin) — A Wisconsin police officer, who killed three people in the line of duty over five years, will not be charged in a fatal 2016 shooting of a 25-year-old man he found sleeping inside a car at a park, special prosecutors said Wednesday.

The special prosecutors, Milwaukee attorney Scott Hansen and La Crosse County District Attorney Tim Gruenke, announced their review of the incident did not find any legal basis for charging former Wauwatosa police officer Joseph Mensah in the shooting of Jay Anderson Jr.

Mensah, who is now a detective at the Waukesha, Wisconsin, County Sheriff’s Office, told investigators that after approaching Anderson’s parked car around 3 a.m. on June 23, 2016, he noticed a handgun lying on the front seat, according to a synopsis from the Milwaukee Police Department, which investigated the shooting. He claimed that Anderson initially complied with his orders to keep his hands up, but then lunged for the gun, prompting him to use deadly force.

Dash-camera video from Mensah’s squad car showed him shooting Anderson. The autopsy determined Anderson was shot five times in the head and once in the shoulder.

Hansen said Wednesday that a criminal case would have been hard to prove beyond reasonable doubt to a jury that Mensah did not act in self-defense when he shot Anderson.

“We believe the evidence will not permit that,” Hansen said.

The decision by the special prosecutors appears to align with a decision made by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm in 2016 not to charge Mensah.

Chisholm previously cleared Mensah in the fatal 2020 shooting of a 17-year-old, who allegedly refused commands to drop a stolen gun, and the 2015 fatal shooting of a 29-year-old man, who allegedly refused orders to drop a sword.

Milwaukee County Judge Glenn Yamahiro appointed the special prosecutors to review the case last year after hearing evidence in a so-called John Doe hearing that an attorney for Anderson’s family sought. Yamahiro found probable cause to bring homicide charges against Mensah, concluding the evidence showed the officer did not act in self-defense and was negligent in the handling of a dangerous weapon when he shot Anderson.

But the judge declined to file charges and opted to have the case reviewed by special prosecutors he appointed.

Yamahiro denied a motion filed Wednesday by Kimberley Motley, the Anderson family’s lawyer, to appoint new special prosecutors to review the case again.

But Yamahiro said, “I continue to believe that this entire tragedy was avoidable.”

Following Wednesday’s hearing, Anderson’s mother, Linda Anderson, vowed to keep fighting for justice for her son.

“I’m not stopping until that man is behind bars, where he needs to be,” Linda Anderson said.

There was no immediate comment from Mensah.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) — A first-in-the-nation task force in California created to examine slavery and its impact on the Black community released an almost 500-page report on the ongoing harms caused by slavery, political disenfranchisement, segregation and other racist and discriminatory practices.

The report tackles how the impact of systemic racism continues to impact Black Californians to this day.

“Government actions intertwined with private action and segregated America, leading to environmental harms, unequal educational and health outcomes, and over-policing of Black neighborhoods in California and across the nation,” the report states.

It adds, “Government actions and failures over 400 years have created a wealth gap that persists between Black and white Americans at all levels of income, regardless of education or family status.”

The task force, established through a law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2020, sought to offer recommendations for how to remedy that impact – including through monetary compensation, mental, emotional and other types of rehabilitation and other forms of restitution for Black Californians.

“Without accountability, there is no justice. For too long, our nation has ignored the harms that have been — and continue to be — inflicted on African Americans in California and across the country,” said California Attorney General Rob Bonta in a statement Wednesday.

He added, “California was not a passive actor in perpetuating these harms. We must double down on our efforts to address discrimination in our state and nation and take a hard look at our own history, including at the California Department of Justice.”

The report says federal, state and local government actions have been used to oppress Black people.

California entered the Union in 1850 as a free state. However, up to 1,500 enslaved African Americans lived in California by 1852, according to the report.

The early state government supported slavery and enforced a harsh fugitive slave law, it says.

The report shows that California did not ratify the Fourteenth Amendment and Fifteenth Amendment until 1959 and 1962, respectively.

The task force’s researchers found that state agencies were also responsible for demolishing Black neighborhoods in the name of urban renewal and park construction. They say these policies led to the closure of hundreds of businesses, displaced thousands of households and damaged the lives of nearly 20,000 people in San Francisco alone.

The report also says that several cities in the state wouldn’t hire Black workers until the 1940s, while certain public sectors continued to avoid hiring Black workers into the 1970s.

“Today, by some measures, California’s two major industries, Hollywood and Silicon Valley, disproportionately employ fewer African Americans,” the report says.

The report offers several ways in which Black people continue to be disadvantaged.

For example, California remains the sixth most segregated state in the country for Black students. Schools mostly attended by white and Asian children receive more funding and resources than those with predominantly Black and Latino children, according to the report.

In 2021, the life expectancy of an average Black Californian was 75.1 years, six years shorter than the state average. Nearly 40% of California’s homeless population is Black, though the Black population in the state is only 6%, the report states.

These are only a few examples of the ways that racial discrimination has continued to impact Black Californians – from their health to their financial stability, according to the report.

Reparations for these many forms of oppression can be delivered in different ways, it says.

In March, the task force said it would limit reparations to people who could trace their lineage to free and enslaved Black people living in the U.S. during the 19th century.

The decision quickly received criticism by opponents who say the pool of recipients should be widened, considering that enslaved people may not have kept quality records, or that names may have changed since the 19th century.

Dr. Amos C. Brown, the task force’s vice chair, said in a statement Wednesday it was “a privilege” to serve on a task force with “the moral obligation” to right the wrongs perpetuated against the African American community.

“Other groups that have suffered exclusion, oppression, and downright destruction of human existence have received reparations, and we should have no less,” Brown said.

The task force will now consider several different avenues of remedying the damaging effects of racism.

The report says this includes ending “legal slavery” by removing discriminatory language that still remains in California law, paying incarcerated people fairly, eliminating discrimination in policing and developing policies that eliminate the emotional, financial and medical toll that systemic racism has had on Black people.

The task force could weigh policies concerning education, the environment, cultural institutions, voting and more.

An upcoming final report will include the task force’s official recommendation, but a date has not been set for its release.

Copyright © 2022, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.