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August 2, 2006

Foot found may belong to missing URI student

NARRAGANSETT -- A foot caught in a fisherman’s net last week may belong to Geoffrey M. Wilkes, the Glocester teen who disappeared along with two other University of Rhode Island students on Narragansett Bay in March, state authorities said today.

On July 25, a fisherman discovered a black shoe with bones in his net while trolling off Bonnet Shores before 9 a.m., said Department of Environmental Management spokeswoman Gail Mastrati. The Coast Guard and DEM turned the remains over the medical examiner’s office, she said.

“The medical examiner is in possession of some human remains, and based on the personal effects found with those remains,” they are likely from Wilkes, spokeswoman Annemarie Beardsworth said.

The medical examiner has asked the FBI to do DNA testing to confirm the state’s findings, Beardsworth said. She would not elaborate on what personal items were found. “Our investigation is not officially closed,” she said.

The 18-year-old Wilkes was one of three URI students who rowed onto the fog-shrouded Bay in the predawn hours on March 13. The three students drank and socialized with a small group of friends before taking an aluminum rowboat into the Bay.

The bodies of Fandia Mahoud Shloul, 21, of Pawtucket, and Daniel P. Donahue, 20, also of Glocester, were found by the Coast Guard in late April.

-- Journal staff writer Paul Davis

Posted by Steve Peoples  at 3:50 PM | Permalink

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