Albert the alligator could be headed home to NY after owner fought tooth and nail to get reptile BFF back from state
He may be seeing you later, alligator.A 750-pound alligator seized by government agents from a Buffalo-area home could be headed back upstate after a judge determined the Department of Environmental Conservation wrongly denied its owners’ application for a dangerous animals permit.Albert — a 34-year-old gator who spent his life in a lavish pen at owner Tony Cavallaro’s Hamburg house until the government came knocking nearly a year ago — might be back home as early as April after a New York Judge ruled the DEC must issue a new ruling on Cavallaro’s application by mid-March, or return the beast to Cavallaro within 10 days.“I fought tooth and nail for this,” a delighted but still determined Cavallaro told The Post.“They never expected somebody to come back and fight them like I did.
They thought they were going to come in and walk all over me like some pansy.”Cavallaro — who was fully permitted to own Albert for nearly 30 years until a state rules around dangerous animal ownership changed — sued the DEC over the summer and claimed his 2020 reapplication to keep the gator was ignored until armed agents showed up at his door years later in March 2024.The agents carted the animal away to a Texas petting zoo before summarily denying the application, Cavallaro said.But after a December hearing, an Erie County court determined the DEC was in error for considering the application denied because it failed to adequately respond to it for three years, after which time it was reasonable for Cavallaro to believe it had been accepted.The judge ruled Cavallaro’s original permit open again, and told the DEC around Feb.
14 it had 30 days to respond or else the application would be considered accepted and Albert would come home.“There’s no guarantee, but it looks good,” Cavallaro said of the chances he’ll soon be seeing the gator, who he’s often described as a lovable beast full of personality and affection.Though the DEC technically could simply den...