Updated information referencing the water incident:

9-8-25 – Cody Johnson, 28, of St. Paris, was identified by the Logan County Sheriff’s Office on Monday.

-As of 7:33pm on 9/6/25 the male victim has been located by the Logan County Sheriff’s Office-no name has yet been released.

On 09/06/2025 at 1:16pm the Logan County Dispatch Center received a frantic 911 call reporting a 28 yr old male who had been out on a canoe, went into the water and had not surfaced. The location was said to be at Adventure Trails campground 3299 SR 540 in Bellefontaine, OH.. Logan County Sheriff’s office deputies drove in emergency response, along with Bellefontaine Fire/Ems and Tri Valley Ems who were paged.

Upon the LCSO deputies’ arrival at 1:23pm they radioed that that the male was still unaccounted for and under the water and there were bystanders that had entered the water in an attempt to rescue this male. The deputies, who had just arrived, removed their duty gear and jumped into the water in a rescue attempt. They swam roughly 30-40 feet out into a large pond where a canoe was overturned and floating away. They were able to bring an adult female and male to the shore, who had jumped in as well in an attempt to rescue the 28 yr old male. Several attempts diving under the water were attempted by deputies, but they were not able to find the 28 yr old male.

A Dive Team from Indian Joint Fire had been called to the scene and arrived and began a grid search of the water below. At the time of this report the body of the 28 yr old male had not yet been located after having divers in the water for several hours. Resources from Columbus Division of Fire were contacted for a boat, sonar and additional divers to come to the pond to assist, and were responding from Columbus.

In speaking with the witness, the adult girlfriend of the 28 yr old male, she advised they were both from Marysville, OH., and had been camping for the weekend at Adventure Trails. Her boyfriend had taken her 5 year old daughter (he was not the father) out onto the pond on a pleasure ride in a standard canoe. Her daughter began to scream after the canoe began taking on water. Her mother then got into a kayak and paddled out to their location. She was able to retrieve her daughter from the water, however her boyfriend had gone under the water. She reported she thought he was underneath the overturned canoe. She brought her daughter back to shore and then swam out to the overturned canoe. It was at this time that the deputy who arrived on scene and dove out to her, as she had no life jacket on and was now suffering from exhaustion from swimming back to the location of the overturned canoe. The 28 yr old male did not have a life jacket on either when he went into the water.

When updates are available information will be updated.