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DROWNING VICTIM RECOVERED

By Ray King/OF THE COMMERCIAL STAFF
Tuesday, July 21, 2009 3:28 PM CDT

The body of a Pine Bluff man who drowned in the Arkansas River near Island Harbor Saturday after diving off a party barge was recovered Sunday morning by Jefferson County Sheriff’s deputies.

Major Greg Bolin said deputies found the body of Verma Jay West, 44, at 8:45 a.m. about 100 feet from the area where he was reportedly last seen by others on a party barge.

“He was swimming around some barges and tried to swim under one and didn’t come up,” Bolin said.

Deputies used two boats during a search that lasted about two hours Saturday night before it was called off because of darkness.

“We had three boats in the water Sunday and had to do some re-rigging so we actually didn’t get started until about 8:30 a.m.

“We came out here Sunday and we were prepared to stay until we got it done,” Bolin said.

Sheriff Gerald Robinson said deputies used their new sonar unit, which has been in service for about three weeks, to locate the body. “We got it with grant money so it didn’t cost the taxpayers of Jefferson County a cent.”

“We were able to find the body a lot quicker than we would have before when we had to just do dragging operations,” Robinson said. “There was a lot of debris on the bottom of the river because of construction so there were a lot of possibilities but we got a blip about where we thought the body might be and after a couple of passes, were able to determine we were right,” Bolin said. “The river conditions were really good and there was no real current so that helped us a lot.”

Robinson said about 10 regular and reserve deputies were involved in the search effort Saturday and Sunday.

“The guys got out there and did what they had to do and I’m really proud of all of them,” he said.

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