‘Drunk’ tourist Anthony Lessa sexually molests a manatee statue outside a Florida restaurant when staff told him to leave after he threw FRIED alligator pieces inside eatery

• Anthony Michael Lessa, 23, had been asked to leave the restaurant after being told he had paid his bill and became upset 
• He became ‘physically aggressive’ with an employee and started to throw the nuggets across the dining area before he fled 
• Once he finally left, he ‘assaulted’ the plastic manatee statue in the parking lot 

A Pittsburgh man visiting Florida was arrested and charged after throwing fried ‘gator bites’ across a restaurant and then molesting a manatee statue in the parking lot. 

Deputies were called to Rick’s Reef Bar in St. Pete Beach Friday after reports of an intoxicated man making a disturbance. 

Anthony Michael Lessa, 23, had been asked to leave the restaurant after being told he had paid his bill and became upset.

He became ‘physically aggressive’ with an employee and started to throw the fried alligator nuggets across the dining area before he fled. 

Once he left, he ‘assaulted’ the plastic manatee statue located in the parking lot. Officials said he was again asked to leave.

Lessa ran off the restaurant’s property and toward a nearby hotel where he was staying. 

He was later seen yelling obscenities at the Postcard Inn’s employees, who had also asked him to leave.  Finally, deputies arrived after the employees contacted the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office. 

In video posted by the sheriff’s office, Lessa continually asks what he’s being arrested for and demands to see a lawyer. 

When arrested, police discovered he’d hung on to some of the gator nuggets when they asked if he had any booze or drugs on him. 

‘What is that? Oh that was the crap you had that you were throwing in the other restaurant,’ a deputy says to Lessa as they patted him down. 

‘Nuggets, yeah. Gator nuggets. Shark bites,’ Lessa answers.

Lessa again demands to know what his charges are before an officer slams the backdoor of the police car. 

The officers are then heard joking about the gator nuggets they found in Lessa’s pocket. 

‘I thought it was like cork,’ the deputy says to another deputy. ‘I was like ‘why does he have cork in his pocket?” 

Lessa was booked on a charge of disorderly intoxication, the sheriff’s office said. He was later released.