Thursday March 28th, 2024 2:59PM

Drowning victim was College Park man

By Derreck Booth, B.J. Williams
BUFORD - Hall County Marine Rescue divers recovered the body of a College Park man who drowned in the waters of Lake Lanier Tuesday afternoon at Lake Lanier Islands.

Emergency crews got the call around 4:00 p.m., a report of a man in the water who hadn't been seen for ten to 15 minutes.

"Ground units did identify that there was a male subject still in the water, and when our marine rescue unit arrived, the divers did find a...male in 17 feet of water," Hall County Fire Chief David Kimbrell said.

He estimated the victim had been in the water for about 40 minutes when divers found him.

"They were able to quickly get him out of the water and began resuscitation. Those resuscitation efforts failed and the victim was pronounced dead," Kimbrell said.

Melissa Cummings, Communications/Outreach Specialist, with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR), Wildlife Resources Division, identified the victim as Shaquille Marquise Connor-Blunt, age 20.

Cummings said the incident happened at Sunset Cove on the islands. She said Tuesday night that it appeared the victim and two friends were trying to swim from the beach at Sunset Cove to a boat slip when the victim began to struggle. She said the friends tried to help Connor-Blunt, but they also began to have trouble in the water and almost did not make it to safety.

The Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Hall County Sheriff's Office and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers were handling the investigation, according to Kimbrell.
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