South Florida Sun-Sentinel

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The woman who died after an alligator mauled her near Markham Park in May had toxic levels of alcohol and Xanax in her system, the Broward County medical examiner’s office said Monday.

Still, Yovahana “Yovy” Suarez-Jimenez, 28, died as a result of the gator attack, not the mixture, said Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Joshua Perper.

“There are injuries from the alligator which indicate she was alive at the time,” Perper said.

A person is considered too impaired to drive with a blood alcohol concentration above .08, and Perper said the Davie, Fla., woman’s was three times that level. She also had twice the amount of the highest prescribed dosage of Xanax in her blood, said Harold Schueler, chief toxicologist.

The combination impaired Suarez-Jimenez’ judgment, Perper said, but with no witnesses to her death, it was impossible to tell how.

“There’s no way to determine if she fell in or passed out,” said Sunrise (Fla.) Police spokesman Lt. Robert Voss.

Police said they were not able to locate any witnesses to the May 10 attack.

Florida Wildlife officials believe Suarez-Jimenez was dragged into a canal after she sat next to it, dangling her feet over the water. She went jogging around 7:30 p.m. and talked to relatives later that night.

Construction workers found her body floating in the canal the day she died. Her arms were later recovered in the belly of the gator, which was caught four days later in the same canal.

Family and friends would not comment on the test results.

Suarez-Jimenez had worked in real estate and modeling in the past, but studied criminal justice at Florida Atlantic University before she died.

Friends have described her as energetic, full of life and close with her sister, whom she helped by babysitting her niece.