Bodies Found In Search For Drowned Teenagers
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - A small group of family and friends held each other for comfort as police pulled a body out of the Delaware River.
They had been there all day, waiting for news from the search for William Wilkinson, 17, who drowned Wednesday evening. Police say Wilkinson drowned when he jumped into the water, trying to save a friend who fell in. But he never resurfaced.
Police boats and rescue teams circled the waters, trying to find any sign of the teenager. In the end, it was a single police boat that found a body thirty feet off the pier at 4:30 in the afternoon. Police say the physical description and clothing description match Wilkinson's.
Loved ones left messages at Pennypack Park on the Delaware River for Wilkinson. The Abraham Lincoln High School student is one of three teenagers who drowned on Wednesday evening, all in unprotected waters.
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"If they're unsupervised, you're basically playing with your life," said Jim Shew, a rescue diver with Woolwich Fire Department in New Jersey,
Shew was part of the search for Akeem Cody, 16. Firefighters say Cody was one of about thirty teenagers jumping off the Conrail Bridge into the Raccoon Creek when he drowned.
Cody's father watched rescue crews at work trying to find his son.
"This is just hard," said Demetrius Cody. "I don't know what to say."
Rescue teams found Cody's body at 12:30 in the afternoon.
Reported by Oren Liebermann, CBS 3
