On Sunday at about 8:35 p.m. Temple police were notified of the missing boy, identified as Marcus Woodruff, according to a press release from the police department.
He was last seen on the property of Crossroads Distribution, 701 E. Ave. K, in a pond. He and two other boys had scaled a fence surrounding the property to play near a body of water at that location, the release said.
“The boys were going fishing,” said Woodruff’s uncle, David Wayne Daniels.
One of the boys had lost his glasses in the lake. Woodruff had never learned how to swim, but jumped in to help the boy find his glasses, Daniels said.
The boys saw him come up four times and tried to use a tree limb to help him get out of the lake, Daniels said.
Officers responded but were unable to locate or view the child.
Additional resources were summoned to the scene, including two K-9 search teams from the Temple Police Department, Temple Fire and Rescue, the Central Texas Regional Air Support Unit, Scott & White EMS, and a dive team coordinated by the Morgan’s Point Resort Police Department.
At 11:45 p.m. divers found the child in the water about 20 feet from the shore. Justice of the Peace G.W. Ivey pronounced death and ordered an autopsy at the Southwest Institute of Forensic Sciences in Dallas.
“I want the family to know that little Marcus will be with his grandpa in heaven and he will always be guiding his mother and his two brothers,” Daniels said.
Friends of the family are trying to help cover Woodruff’s funeral expenses. To help, call Barbara Steele at (254) 421-3250.
