Police: ‘No foul play’ in death of 7-year-old boy found in water near Carson Beach
Police said that after preliminary investigation, the death of Kyzr Willis, the 7-year-old boy who was found dead in the water at Carson Beach on Tuesday, has been ruled as an accidental drowning, Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said during a press conference Friday afternoon.
During the conference, Evans said the medical examiner office’s report and witness accounts led to their ruling.
The L Street day camp, which runs from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., offers a variety of activities for campers, including swimming. Around 2:15 p.m., the campers were given the order to exit the water—the same order they are given at that time every day—to make their way to the bathhouse and change before getting picked up.
Councilors and campers told police they saw Willis get out of the water wearing his fluorescent swim trunks. Police said Willis’s brother and cousin were also seen exiting the water and making their way toward the bathhouse.
At 2:30 p.m., lifeguards reported that the beach was clear of all swimmers, and they made their way toward the bathhouse. While in the bathhouse, Willis’s brother told a councilor that Willis was missing and that his clothes were still next to his belongings. The camp began an immediate search of the area and lifeguards of the water, according to Evans.
By 2:40 p.m. the beach’s water supervisor shut down both the K and L Street beaches, calling in all lifeguards from the area to assist with the search. Evans said lifeguards locked arms as they scanned the beach during the chaotic search, and that at least eight lifeguards also searched the water. During this time, the camp also alerted Willis’s parents that their child was missing. Evans said the director of the L Street Bathhouse reported the missing child to police by 2:49 p.m.
Evans said police arrived on scene just after 2:50 p.m. and called for a deployment of all emergency partners, including the coast guard. The search lasted approximately four hours, police said.
Around 6 p.m., emergency personnel picked up an image of Willis’s body in the water, about 20 yards out from the shore, Evans said.
“They got a good picture of the young child, which confirmed our worst nightmare,” he said.
Divers retrieved the child’s body, according to police, and pronounced him dead just before 7:10 p.m.
“The big question is the timeline of when he went to the water,” Evans said. “We don’t know the exact time, but we approximate it somewhere between that 2:15-to-2:30 time after he was clearly seen exiting the water.”
Evans went on to describe Willis as the “star of the camp,” saying he “was loved” and that the staff “watched out for him.” Evans added that counselors described the boy as a poor swimmer, and that one staff member had been playing in the water and teaching him how to swim earlier that day.
“He was described to us as ‘the star,’ to the point that they bought him the swimming trunks and shirt he was wearing, and made sure he was fed every day,” Evans said. “Those two children were special, and that’s why honestly those campers, the lifeguards, and the directors of L Street are taking this exceptionally hard.”
“It breaks our hearts … the whole city is grieving that we lost such a young child,” Evans added.
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