Pocono News Section

Body Discovered in Lackawanna River

Body Discovered in Lackawanna River - Tuesday, April 8, 2008 at 7:04PM EST

Reported by: Eric Deabill
Tuesday, Apr 8, 2008 @07:04pm EST
SCRANTON, LACKAWANNA COUNTY - The Lackawanna County coroner and Scranton police are working together to identify a body found Tuesday afternoon in the Lackawanna River. The discovery was made by a young couple just after 1:00 PM near the Lackwanna County Heritage Trial.

19-year-old Krystal DelGuercio and her boyfriend, 22-year-old John James were walking along the trial when they spotted something unusual in the water.

"I saw three different colors in the water. At first I was like, is it a body or is it something in the water? Then I said, babe, I think it's a body," DelGuercio said.

James went down the 25-foot embankment and was surprised to find the body face down in the river with his legs turned sideways.

"Shock. Instant shock. The first thing that came to mind was to get up to the house and call the cops, call 911. You just don't want someone sitting down there like that," James said.

More than a dozen Scranton firefighters and police officers, many who have been trained in rope rescues, responded to the scene to recover the body. It was a slow and technical task which took more than an hour.

"We had to get a hauling system with a rope line because of the steepness of the embankment and also take other precautions because of the water moving quite rapidly," Assistant Fire Chief Jim Floryshak said.

Exactly who the victim is and what he was doing near the river remains a mystery. The county coroner says the victim is a white man, between 35 and 45 years-old, 160-170 pounds with brown hair and a brown mustache. He also had two tattooes on his left arm. One was of Budweiser and the other said "mom."