Man found dead in Great Miami River identified

A 57-year-old Hamilton man has been identified as the person found dead Tuesday inside a vehicle submerged in the Great Miami River in Hamilton.

Damien T. Varner is the person discovered and pulled out of a white SUV Tuesday night, according the Butler County Coroner’s Office and police.

Varner’s cause of death is drowning and it has been ruled an accident.

Just before 3:45 p.m. Tuesday Butler County Sheriff’s Office Emergency Response Services Team and the Task Force One Dive Team responded to the Great Miami River, south of the Columbia Road bridge, for a vehicle in the water. Teams worked for hours in the icy water before pulling the vehicle from the water after dark.

There were no 911 calls, according to Butler County dispatch, but rather a Hamilton police detective saw the vehicle in the river after he was following up on a missing person report filed Monday.

Assisted by GPS tracking in the vehicle, Hamilton detective Jeff Benge responded to the riverbank of the Great Miami River, the last known location of the vehicle. He searched the riverbank and discovered a submerged vehicle under the ice.

Additional officers responded and used a drone to confirm the vehicle submerged in the ice matched the description of the vehicle the victim was last known to be driving.

The county emergency response team used its underwater drone, which confirmed the presence of a deceased victim inside the vehicle.

“Due to the hazardous conditions and freezing temperatures additional equipment was needed to recover the victim and the vehicle,” according to a statement by the Hamilton Police Department.

The vehicle was extracted from the river around 10 p.m. Tuesday.