Sanford police safely remove ball python from apartment bathroom

Sanford police ended an unusual apartment call on June 22 with a safe snake removal and no injuries after a large ball python was found in a bathroom. Officer Sozio and Officer Moore secured the reptile, and the Sanford Police Department later shared a photo that played into the moment with a nod to helping with “a criminal, critter, or unexpected bathroom guest.”

The animal itself was not the danger, but the setting showed how quickly an escaped pet can become a public-safety and animal-welfare issue in a crowded building. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission guidance says ball pythons are nonnative, non-established animals in Florida, with no known breeding populations in the state, and adults typically grow to about 3 to 4 feet long. Standard personal ownership does not require a special FWC permit, though commercial breeding and sales may require licensing.

That regulatory split leaves a gap that apartment residents and landlords can run into fast. A snake can be legal to own, but releasing it into the wild is against Florida law and is treated as animal cruelty. For a building manager or a tenant who finds a reptile in a shared hallway, laundry room or bathroom, the immediate issue is containment and safe removal, not guesswork about whether the animal belongs there. Sanford police handled this one; state wildlife officials also direct residents to report nonnative species through the Exotic Species Hotline at 888-Ive-Got1, or 888-483-4681.

Florida tightened its rules further on Feb. 25, 2021, when commissioners added 16 high-risk nonnative reptiles to the state’s Prohibited list. That list includes Burmese python, reticulated python, green anaconda, northern African python, southern African python, amethystine python and scrub python. Ball pythons are not on that prohibited list, but the story still lands in the same policy lane: Florida relies on prevention, early detection, rapid response, control and management, and education and outreach to limit the damage from animals that do not belong in the wild.

The broader concern is rooted in the state’s long struggle with released and escaped pythons. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service material says Burmese pythons became established in southern Florida by the 1980s, and more than 180,000 were brought into the United States through the live pet trade from 1975 to 2018. Federal wildlife officials say Burmese pythons contributed to a 95% decrease in observations of some mammal species in Everglades National Park from 1996 to 2016, even though the snakes are not venomous and pose very low risk to human safety.

For people who can no longer keep an exotic pet, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Exotic Pet Amnesty Program offers a free, year-round surrender option for nonnative pets, including conditional and prohibited species. In a building like the one in Sanford, that kind of legal off-ramp can keep a bathroom rescue from becoming a neighborhood problem.