Thursday, October 1, 2026
Efrain Cruz first believed he was seeing one of the brown paper bags typically scattered across the floor of his Mineola auto body shop on Aug. 14. Upon closer inspection, though, he found something much more alarming — a copperhead snake.
Cruz said he had only been in his office for a half-hour when he saw the creature, and at first he didn’t know what to do. “I’ve never seen a snake on Long Island before,” Cruz, of Bellmore, said. “It was scary.”
The dark-brown reptile was a foot outside the back garage door of his shop, A2D Auto Works. In its mouth was its prey, a small mouse.
Cruz lifted the snake off the ground with a shovel and gingerly placed it in a rectangular plastic bin. At this point, he said, the snake dropped the mouse and began lunging, trying to escape from the bin.
“I reached out and sent pictures to a friend that knows about animals and reptiles,” he said. “He quickly responded, ‘Don’t get near it. That snake is dangerous. It’s not just someone’s pet.’”
Cruz called police, who arrived shortly after with Nassau County SPCA officials.
“Copperhead snake bites are venomous,” said SPCA Detective Gary Rogers, who responded to the scene. “While it’s rare for them to be fatal, it would still cause muscle and nerve damage. And a Bronx hospital is the closest option to treat venomous bites.”
Rogers said he would not recommend anyone who is untrained in handling wildlife to get close to or handle a creature like the copperhead, as Cruz did when he placed it in the bin. If anything, he said, the bin could have been dropped over the snake to prevent it from slithering away.
Rogers and other SPCA officials safely transported the snake to the Bronx Zoo, where at press time it remained.
Rogers explained that it was unusual to find a cooperhead on Long Island. Northern cooperheads can be found in New York state, but they are most often found upstate, where it is less populous.
There are few who are licensed to possess copperheads, and most of the snakes are only held in animal rehabilitation centers or zoo exhibits. One of the few nearby centers, in Massachusetts, trains local law enforcement on how to handle animals like snakes, Rogers explained.
“People who own these dangerous animals start problems,” Rogers said. “People get bit and animals get hurt.”
The SPCA is investigating this recent snake incident. It is unclear whether the copperhead was illegally owned, or a rare case of a snake traveling farther outside of its habitat. A $5,000 reward is being offered to anyone who can provide information on where the snake came from.
“It’s dangerous to have animals like that around here,” Cruz said. “I bring my two kids here every Friday. Now I restrict them from going to the back of the shop, just to be safe.”
