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Three die in Georgia lakes

By Bill Rankin

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 05/27/06 07:24 AM

Two teenage brothers and a middle-age woman preparing to enjoy the Memorial Day weekend drowned Friday in two Georgia lakes.

The brothers were with fellow church members Friday afternoon at West Point Lake in Troup County.

Dominique Andrews, 16, and Robrica Andrews, 14, both from Griffin, were jumping off the dock with a friend at the Holiday Marina and did not come back up to the surface. About an hour later, divers pulled the two bodies out of the lake, Troup County coroner Jeffrey Cook said this morning.

“We were told they were trying to touch the bottom,” Cook said, who noted that the water at the dock was about 10 feet deep.

The brothers had been sent on an errand to get some ice, Lt. Rick Massie of the Troup County Sheriff’s Department said.

“While en route, they apparently decided to jump in and cool off,” he said. “We try and tell people to be careful around water. This was hard on all of us yesterday. It’s a tragedy.”

Dominique and Robrica were with another teen who reported that the two brothers had disappeared in the water. Troup County deputies were quickly called to the scene.

“These boys supposedly could swim,” Cook said. “But these lakes, whether it’s down here or Lake Lanier or whatever, they’re big and the water’s deep and I wish people would realize that. It’s not like a small little swimming pool, and I just wish people would be a whole lot more careful.”

The boys were not on an official church excursion but were with fellow members of the Rock Tabernacle church in Griffin, Cook said. “It’s just something really bad that happened to these people.”

Just a month ago, an 11-year-old boy from Decatur drowned at West Point Lake. He had jumped into the water off a pontoon boat. His body surfaced about eight days later, Cook said.

Georgia Department of Natural Resources officials reported that a woman drowned at Lake Allatoona.

Friday evening, a 45-year-old woman, whose name has yet to be released, either jumped or fell off a boat near the Allatoona Landing marina. Her body was recovered after DNR rangers were called to the scene, DNR public information officer Melissa Cummings said today.