By The Associated Press
A Pennsylvania man who credits an alligator named Wally with helping him ease his depression for nearly a decade is now searching for the reptile after it went missing during a vacation on the Georgia coast.
Joie Henney has thousands of followers on her social media accounts dedicated to Wally, the cold-blooded sidekick she calls her emotional support alligator. The man has posted photos and videos online of people petting the four-foot reptile as if it were a dog, or hugging it like a teddy bear. Wally’s popularity increased last year when he was denied entry to a Philadelphia Phillies baseball game.
Now, Henney says he is distraught after Wally’s disappearance in April, when they went on vacation together in Brunswick, Georgia, a port city 70 miles south of Savannah. The man suspects that someone stole it during the night of April 21.
In posts on his social media, Henney said people jokingly left Wally outside the house of someone who called authorities, causing his alligator to be trapped and released into the wild.
“We need all the help we can get to bring my baby back,” Henney said tearfully in a video posted on TikTok. “Please, we need your help.”
Henney added that he did not have time to talk when The Associated Press reached him by phone Wednesday morning. He did not immediately return several subsequent messages.
The Jonestown, Pennsylvania, man has said Wally came into his life in 2015 after the alligator was rescued in Florida at the age of 14 months. Henney told The Philadelphia Inquirer in 2019 that the animal helped him ease depression after the deaths of several close friends. He indicated that a doctor treating his depression had designated Wally as an emotional support animal.
“He has never tried to bite anyone,” Henney told the newspaper.
No one has filed police reports about the missing alligator in Brunswick and surrounding Glynn County, according to spokespeople for the city and county police departments.
The Georgia Department of Natural Resources confirmed that someone in the Brunswick area reported a nuisance alligator on April 21 — the day Henney said Wally went missing — and that an authorized person was sent to capture it. The agency mentioned in a statement that the alligator was “released in a remote location,” but stressed that it does not know if the reptile was Wally.
In Georgia, it is illegal to own alligators without a special license or permit, and the state Department of Natural Resources said it does not grant permits to keep alligators as pets. In Pennsylvania, there is no state law prohibiting the possession of alligators, although it is illegal for owners to release them into the wild, according to its Fish and Boat Commission.
David Mixon, a wildlife biologist and coastal supervisor for the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, has seen plenty of alligators in yards and pools. He has also shown captive alligators in presentations to school groups and Boy Scout troops.
The specialist indicated that even alligators that appear docile can be dangerous, and he always makes sure to keep their mouths closed with a hand or, preferably, with a tape.
“They are unpredictable and tend to react to stimuli,” Mixon explained. “There are many videos and photos of people handling alligators and doing it without getting hurt. But the more time you spend around them, the more likely you are to get injured.”
Authorities in neighboring Florida, home to an estimated 1.3 million alligators, have recorded more than 450 cases of unprovoked bites since 1948. That includes more than 90 since 2014, six of them fatal.
According to Lori Kogan, a psychologist and professor at Colorado State University who studies human-animal interactions, in states where the law allows alligators to be kept in the home, they can be considered emotional support animals.
Unlike service animals that help people with conditions such as blindness or post-traumatic stress disorder, emotional support animals do not have special training, Kogan said. They also do not have an official record, although health professionals often write letters of support to owners with a diagnosed mental disorder.
“People can get very attached to different animals,” Kogan said. “Can you get attached to a reptile? Can it comfort you? I would say yes. To me personally? No.”