Body found in Cedar River identified as missing Cedar Rapids employee

Jan. 5, 2023 9:54 am, Updated: Jan. 5, 2023 4:45 pm

Searchers with the Cedar Rapids Fire Department as well as Iowa Task Force 1 K9 Stark and handler Sheri Morrissey search the Cedar River for Erik Spaw along Ellis Road, about a mile north of the intersection with Edgewood Road in northwest Cedar Rapids on May 9, 2022. Crews continued searching for the city of Cedar Rapids Water Division employee whose fleet truck was found submerged in the Cedar River not far from where he was working. (Jim Slosiarek/The Gazette)

Signs asking for information about the disappearance and presumed drowning of Cedar Rapids city water division worker Erik Spaw are seen along the Cedar River in Cedar Rapids on Sept. 6, 2022. Spaw’s remains were discovered by hunters on Dec. 30. (Jim Slosiarek/The Gazette)

CEDAR RAPIDS — Human remains that were found in the Cedar River last week have been identified as Erik Spaw, a Cedar Rapids employee who went missing last summer, according to a news release from the Cedar Rapids Police Department.

Spaw, 54, was reported missing on May 7. He’d been working the night before at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant at 7807 Ellis Rd. NW, and was reported missing by his co-workers, who noticed he never returned to the J Avenue Water Treatment Plant, where his personal car was parked.

Spaw’s city-owned pickup truck was found submerged in the Cedar River just upriver from the Edgewood Road bridge with no one inside. His mother, Karen Spaw, told The Gazette at the time that he had diabetes and he’d been having trouble regulating his insulin intake, so she believed he may have passed out from low-blood sugar and driven into the river.

Cedar Rapids search crews spent several days on the river looking for Spaw, and periodically returned throughout the summer to continue searching.

On Friday Dec. 30, hunters spotted Spaw’s remains in the Cedar River just below the water treatment facility near Bertram Road in Cedar Rapids. A Cedar Rapids water rescue team located and recovered the remains, which were sent to the Iowa Office of the State Medical Examiner.

The medical examiner’s office identified the remains as Spaw’s Thursday morning. Foul play is not suspected in his death, according to the news release from the police department.

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