The body of an Ohio doctor who vanished in late November has been recovered, and officials have now shared his cause of death.
Dr. Cletus Iwuagwu, 71, was reported missing on Nov. 25 in Springfield Township, Ohio, according to a Lucas County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO) report obtained by PEOPLE. His daughter contacted authorities that day after his niece last saw him around 8 p.m. on Nov. 24. In the weeks that followed, investigators searched using drones, K-9 teams, and dozens of volunteers.
About a month later, on Thursday, Dec. 25, the Lucas County Coroner’s Office (LCCO) said deputies found Iwuagwu’s body in Orchard Lake near Stone Oak Country Club. The Springfield Fire Department retrieved the body from the water, and the remains were later identified as Iwuagwu.
On Friday, the coroner’s office said an autopsy determined Iwuagwu died by drowning. Officials added there were no signs of trauma or foul play.
Even with the cause of death confirmed, the coroner’s office said the circumstances surrounding what happened are still under investigation.
“It’s been like a cloud that has been over us because we somehow seemed to feel or know that he was there,” resident Dusty Foreman told WTOL. “Over the past month, I’ve been out there several times and this time, unfortunately, on Christmas, they did find the body.”
Iwuagwu served as a professor in the University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences, Department of Medicine, and worked as a UToledo Health geriatric medicine physician.
“He is a well-respected physician, and we share the community’s hope for his safe return as law enforcement continues to investigate his missing-person case,” a University of Toledo Medical Center spokesperson previously told ABC 13.
Before his death, a family member told a responding officer that Iwuagwu had been released from a local hospital on Nov. 24 and returned home. He was last seen on surveillance video near his home in Holland around 2:15 a.m. on Nov. 25.
One of his daughters told police she had been receiving location updates about her father on her phone. But when officials went to check the reported location, they were unable to find him.
