Komo- Police on Monday found the body of a 36-year-old man who was reported missing early Sunday morning on Lake Union.
The Police Department’s harbor unit recovered the body using sonar.
Friends and family identified the victim as Yetbarek Demoze of Seattle.
Demoze’s wife said by phone on Monday that her husband came home around 3:30 Sunday morning and told her he was going to give friends a ride home. It’s unclear at what point the group headed to the water. The men were on a 25-foot boat that belonged to Demoze.
“Sadly, I was supposed to be on a boat with him that Sunday,” said Demoze’s friend Shakespear Feyissa.
Police and fire authorities responded to reports of a noise disturbance near the 1900 block of Westlake Avenue North just before 7 a.m. Sunday Callers said the noise was coming from a boat in the waters of Lake Union.
Harbor patrol officers responded and founds several people on board a 25-foot boat who were yelling for help, officials with the Seattle Police Department say.
The people on the boat said that one of the passengers jumped into the water and never surfaced.
Feyissa, who’s known Demoze for 20 years, said he was waiting for Demoze to pick him up Sunday morning when he got the call his friend was missing.
“He’s very close to me. Like a brother to me,” said Feyissa.
Friends said Demoze, 36, worked for a truck company and had two children.
“As a community we are heartbroken,” said Feyissa. “When anything happens in our community (Demoze) is the first one to lend a helping hand, to donate money, to be there for all of us.”
The Medical Examiner’s Office is expected to do an autopsy and make positive identification of the body.
