PALATKA, Fla. — The Palatka Police Department has confirmed with Action News Jax that the bodies of two people were found in the St. Johns River by a dive team after an hours-long search by Palatka’s Riverfront Park.
Police say 20-year-old Wilbert Rivera Cifuentes and 21-year-old Deyfri Roblero Morales died after going into the water with about four other men last night in search of an “object” that has not yet been named. Officers say neither of the men could swim, and they never came back up after going into the water.
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Action News Jax spoke with a group of people at the park, claiming to be their family, but they did not wish to speak with us on camera. We saw the Putnam County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission pull the two men out of the water around the time.
One woman, Valerie Creeach, drove about 30 minutes from her home in Interlachen to the park after the sheriff’s office had posted about the search online.
“I’ve seen so many stories. I know people who have been out in the water, and they never come back,” Creeach said.
Exactly two months before the search for the two men, Action News Jax told you about another man, Jeremiah Beck, who drowned in the St. Johns River after local law enforcement told us he fell from a kayak. Last year, Action News Jax reported the deaths of two boys, both younger than five years old, after Putnam County deputies said they drowned as well.
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For people like Creeach, it makes her feel unsafe bringing her kids out on the water.
“They need to do something. Put a rule out or something, because this water, like it’s not safe, it’s not.”
The Palatka Police Department tells Action News Jax it’s still investigating the drowning of the two men.
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