It had begun doing what?
Now, I'm not a huge fan of the idea of death by really nasty teeth, but it absolutely did not begin "the process of encroaching on human areas." In fact, rather the reverse is true.
Aside from that, there was no need to kill it. There are gator wranglers in Florida who could have taken it away and released it somewhere safer for humans and other animals (although not necessarily wildlife in the area it'd have been moved to, but that's nature in action).
And then there's the frequency with which alligators eat.
Since they're not endothermic, they don't need to consume food to regulate their body temperature, so they eat about once a week. In addition, from roughly November to March, they usually don't eat at all.
It'll also be interesting to see of there are complaints of other, smaller, alligators showing up, as the larger ones can and often do make smaller alligators a decent part of their diet.
But I'm willing to bet I can tell how this panned out. Here's what I think happened:
Farmer saw big alligator. Farmer decided a'killin' that thar varmint would be just about the bess thing sin' ah got Peggy Sue all blewed up on our weddin' naght.
Then called his "Huntin' Guide" friend and after a few Pabst Blue Ribbons straight from the can decided they wuz gunna go git' ol' Bigboy an then we gunna skin 'im up an howDEEE! I'll have me the bess boots an' belts this side o' Axahatchahoochee Skunklick Falls!
I'd be willing to bet that not once did the idea of contacting people qualified to take it away as humanely as possible every crossed their minds.
Especially since hunter Blake Godwin said, "We didn’t do this to get famous. We did this because this is how we make a living.”
