Police have recovered the body of an Atlanta teacher who disappeared in a boating incident on Lake Oconee last month.
Gary Jones' body was found near the spot where his fiancée, Spelman College instructor Joycelyn Wilson, was found dead the day after the incident. Putnam County Sheriff Howard Sills told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that Jones' body was pulled up from about 45-feet underwater.
On February 8, Jones and Wilson visited a marina near Lake Oconee. The couple were celebrating Jones' 50th birthday and rented a boat for the occasion. They never made it back to land.
Witnesses who later spotted the couple's boat in the lake said it was aimlessly driving in circles on the water. Bystanders reported the circling boat to police, who investigated the lake and found Wilson's body in the area. But there was no sign of Jones save for his sneakers floating near the boat.
According to Sills, Jones was finally found more than a month after the initial incident by a search-and-recovery expert from Wisconsin, Keith Cormican. Jones' family reportedly hired Cormican to help locate the man's remains with an arsenal of sonar equipment.
Lake Oconee can get deep, more than 100 feet in its deepest reaches, and trees felled during the damming of the Oconee River approximately 50 years ago still line the lake's floor. Both made it difficult for divers searching the area for a body.
During their search, investigators used a cadaver dog, a helicopter, and their own boats to comb the lake for any sign of Jones. The United Cajun Navy, a civilian volunteer group of boaters who help during missing persons searches and following disasters, also joined the hunt.
Even the U.S. Secret Service was pulled into the saga: Wilson was found clutching her cellphone, and investigators asked the federal agency to help them unlock the device.
Like his fiancée, Jones was an educator. He worked at Westminster Schools, which is a private school in the Atlanta area. According to the school's president, Keith Evans, Jones began working at the school in 2002. In addition to teaching middle school students, he was also the eighth grade basketball coach and the head of the school's track and field program, according to Atlanta News First.
“I have had the privilege of connecting with alumni, parents, students, and faculty members who have shared stories of Gary's legacy and the many ways he inspired both his students and colleagues. He has profoundly impacted the Wildcat community and his passing will be felt well beyond the boundaries of our campus,” Evans said.
Sills told Fox 5 Atlanta that the hunt for Jones was the most involved search for a drowned person he'd seen in his 50 years in law enforcement.
"There's never been anybody looked for like this for 22 days," he told the broadcaster, noting that he was grateful that so many volunteers were willing to give their time to help aid in the search.
