May 6, 2022 – Dodge County, WI – At about 7:57 p.m. on May 5, 2022, the body of a male subject was located and recovered from Fox Lake. The male was turned over to the Dodge County Medical Examiner’s Office after the recovery was made.
While preliminary identification has been made, it is prudent to ensure a final positive identification can be made by the Dodge County Medical Examiner’s Office before a name is released to the public.
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This case remains under investigation by both the Dodge County Sheriff’s Office and the Dodge County Medical Examiner’s Office.
To recap the search efforts, at 12:23 p.m. on April 21, 2022, the Dodge County Sheriff’s Office responded to a capsized canoe. One female, who we can now identify as Alicia Johnson (34 of rural Fox Lake) was rescued, while the male subject was not located. Weather conditions that day included high winds, which became increasingly stronger starting at 10:30 a.m. that morning, gusting to 30 mph winds. This created dangerous conditions for anyone in small watercraft. There were no personal floatation devices (PFD) on the canoe.
That afternoon an extensive search began. Unfortunately, the dive teams that responded were unable to locate the subject, and visibility in the water was reported to be “zero”. Weather conditions for several days following this event made searches dangerous and difficult for dive personnel. When weather conditions improved, dive operations continued at the request of the sheriff. Dive teams, of course, always have the final determination on if divers will go into the water out of the safety of the divers and those teams deemed that several of the following days were unsafe for diving.
Regardless, the sheriff’s office or agents of the sheriff’s office were on the water every day since April 21 conducting surface searches and underwater searches with sonar devices from a variety of different resources, including a side-scan device on the sheriff’s office boat. Points were marked for divers to later go back and search.
This is certainly a very emotional and difficult incident for all involved and we are thankful for all who assisted in this lengthy search. Sheriff Dale Schmidt would like to thank the many people who assisted in the search and eventual recovery of this missing subject.
Those entities include:
Dodge County Sheriff’s Office staff
Dodge County Sheriff’s Office Chaplain
Fond du Lac County Sheriff’s Office Dive Team
Columbia County Sheriff’s Office Dive Team
Marathon County Sheriff’s Office Dive Team
Brown County Sheriff’s Office Dive Team
Beaver Dam Fire Department
Beaver Dam Fire Department Dive Team
Beaver Dam Fire Department Paramedics
Campbellsport Fire Department Dive Team
Fox Lake Fire Department
Fox Lake EMS
Fox Lake Police Department
Waupun Fire Department
Hustisford Fire Department
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources
Numerous volunteer groups
Dodge County Medical Examiner’s Office
