North Carolina
400-pound monster alligator named Pepe ‘detained’ for ‘being a dinosaur without proper papers’ in NC
The scales of justice came for Pepe.
Cops detained – and rescued – a monster 10-foot alligator they nicknamed Pepe the Gator sunbathing on a busy road in North Carolina and “charged” him on suspicion of being a “dinosaur.”
“Witnesses say he was just chilling and snapping, clearly ignoring the ‘no loitering or lounging on roadways’ sign,” the Onslow County Sheriff’s Office wrote in a playful press release last week. “Pepe has been cited for Suspicion of Being a Dinosaur Without Proper Papers, Public Loitering with Intent to Sunbathe, and Obstructing Traffic.”
The responding deputies and officers from the NC Wildlife Resources Commission who got the call on May 25 managed to safely remove Pepe, but not before posing for pictures where they straddle him like rodeo riders.
“He was 10 feet long, 400 pounds. He was an absolute monster,” Trevor Dunnell, spokesman for the Onslow County Sheriff’s Office told the Post Thursday.
“They did a fantastic job of wrangling him.”
To indicate the scale of the gator, Dunnell pointed out how, in the picture, even with three grown men on top of him, Pepe’s still not covered.
“The picture really doesn’t do it justice, I mean 10 feet … 10 feet is a basketball goal, that is a massive creature,” he said.
Although 10 feet seems big, it’s nothing compared to the largest gator on record – 14 feet and 3 and a half inches.
Deputies and wildlife officials used a towel to cover Pepe’s eyes — eye contact is what triggers the animal’s notorious death roll, Dunnell explained — and electrical tape to seal his mouth shut.
“It was definitely some MacGyver stuff they had to use,” he said. “He may not have a good time during the removal, but he was playfully enough about it later to understand that, ‘Hey, man, you gotta do what you gotta do.’”
Dunnell said the office received blowback from people online wishing the cops had just left Pepe alone. but Dunnell was quick to point out that leaving the reptile on the side of the road could have posed a hazard not only to residents but also to the gator.
“You never know what can happen when kids are running around,” he said. “And the gator could wind up in the middle of the road. It could hurt drivers but it could hurt him, too.”
Dunnell said he hopes to see body camera footage of Pepe’s apprehension. The two deputies and the wildlife official in the picture are happy to be riding him, Dunnell said, adding that if authorities encounter another Pepe, they’ll know who to call.
“But some deputies were absolutely not fine,” he said. “When they got back, they were saying, ‘You’re not going to catch me on that thing. I’m not going to go anywhere near it!’”
Pepe was far from home, and Dunnell suspects that it was a hot day and he was looking for a good spot to bask.
“How far he wandered is anybody’s guess,” he said. “It must’ve been several miles at least.”
After further investigation, Dunnell said, they declined to charge Pepe. Instead, they drove him to a boat ramp at nearby Camp Geiger, a satellite facility of Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune.
“I think we’ve touched base with the gator and let him know we dropped the charges,” he joked.
“Pepe’s back to his normal routine, he’s hanging out near the beach and lounging in his natural habitat, hunting for his food and looking for a girlfriend.”
North Carolina
NC Foundation at center of I-Team Troubleshooter investigation could face contempt charge
DURHAM, N.C. (WTVD) — New details in an I-Team investigation into a Durham foundation accused of not paying its employees.
The North Carolina Department of Labor filed a motion in court to try to force the Courtney Jordan Foundation, CJF America, to provide the pay records after the state agency received more than 30 complaints from former employees about not getting paid.
The ABC11 I-Team first told you about CJF and its problems paying employees in July. The foundation ran summer camps in Durham and Raleigh, and at the time, more than a dozen workers said they didn’t get paid, or they got paychecks that bounced. ABC11 also talked to The Chicken Hut, which didn’t get paid for providing meals to CJF Durham’s summer camps, but after Troubleshooter Diane Wilson’s involvement, The Chicken Hut did get paid.
The NC DOL launched their investigation, and according to this motion filed with the courts, since June thirty one former employees of CJF filed complaints with the agency involving pay issues. Court documents state that, despite repeated attempts from the wage and hour bureau requesting pay-related documents from CJF, and specifically Kristen Picot, the registered agent of CJF, CJF failed to comply.
According to this motion, in October, an investigator with NC DOL was contacted by Picot, and she requested that the Wage and Hour Bureau provide a letter stating that CJF was cooperating with the investigation and that repayment efforts were underway by CJF. Despite several extensions, the motion says Picot repeatedly exhibited a pattern of failing to comply with the Department of Labor’s investigation. The motion even references an ITEAM story on CJFand criminal charges filed against its executives.
The NC DOL has requested that if CJF and Picot fail to produce the requested documentation related to the agency’s investigation, the employer be held in civil contempt for failure to comply. Wilson asked the NC Department of Labor for further comment, and they said, “The motion to compel speaks for itself. As this is an ongoing investigation, we are unable to comment further at this time.”
ABC11 Troubleshooter reached out to Picot and CJF America, but no one has responded. At Picot’s last court appearance on criminal charges she faces for worthless checks, she had no comment then.
Out of all the CJF employees we heard from, only one says he has received partial payment.
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Kate Barr is a Democrat.
But when voters in North Carolina’s 14th Congressional District open their ballots in the March primary they’ll find an “R” next to her name.
She is literally a RINO or Republican In Name Only.
Barr considers herself a Democrat but said she’s running as a Republican to make a point about gerrymandering.
“Fundamentally… I hate gerrymandering. That is pretty much my core motivation for everything I do in politics,” Barr told Spectrum News 1.
The district, west of Charlotte, is solidly Republican.
The current congressman won by 16 points last election.
Barr said it speaks to just how gerrymandered North Carolina is. State Republican lawmakers recently approved a congressional map that favors Republicans in 11 of the state’s 14 congressional districts.
That’s in a state that only voted for President Donald Trump by three points in 2024 and elected a Democrat for governor.
“When the North Carolina state legislature passed the new congressional maps that further gerrymandered this state it became clear there has to be a political price for this behavior,” Barr said.
This is not the first unusual campaign for Barr.
In 2024 she ran as a Democrat in a district that heavily favored Republicans. The focus again was to draw attention to gerrymandering.
Her motto was “Kate Barr can’t win.”
She did not win, losing by 30 points.
But Barr was encouraged by some of the results she saw and in November launched her campaign for Congress.
This time she decided to run as a Republican.
She’s hoping that gives her an edge because in North Carolina voters not registered with either major party, known as unaffiliated, are the largest voting block in the state, and can participate in the Democrat or Republican primaries.
“Voters understand that the way to have a say is to choose which primary is actually going to elect their leader and vote in that primary,” Barr said. “I can absolutely win in this one… because primary turnout is so low it just doesn’t take that many people showing up and saying we’ve had enough to unseat an incumbent.”
Barr faces former North Carolina Speaker of the House and incumbent Republican congressman Tim Moore. His campaign told Spectrum News 1 that “Kate Barr’s latest stunt is an insult to Republican voters. Folks know a far-left fraud when they see one, and she doesn’t belong in our primary.”
Whether she wins or not, Barr hopes to encourage a fix to gerrymandering, an issue that’s front and center in North Carolina and around the country.
“Gerrymandering is wrong no matter which party is doing it, and we need to put an end to it. Period,” Barr said. “The goal, end result, is to have an independent commission in every state made up of citizens.”
Follow us on Instagram at spectrumnews1nc for news and other happenings across North Carolina.
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