Search for toddler turns up car, remains in pond

Jacksonville Sheriff's Office homicide detective says car was in pond for years

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Police divers searching a pond off Bowden Road near Interstate 95 late Tuesday morning as part of the effort to find 21-month-old Lonzie Barton found a submerged Mazda RX-7 with human remains inside.

JSO Chief of Investigations Tom Hackney said it was connected to a 2003 missing persons case.

Once the car was pulled out of the water, it took firefighters using a pry bar and sledge hammer to get the doors open. It will be up to the medical examiner to identify the remains and determine the cause of death.

"Anytime we find something like this, we proceed as if there was foul play involved," Sgt. Craig Waldrup said. "It doesn't appear to be, at first sight, but we don't rule it out.

While police indicated it will take the to positively identify the remains, the pond is just over one mile from where a 28-year-old U.S. Navy sailor who disappeared on Jan. 31, 2003, was last seen.

Yaroslav Iventyev

Aviation Machinist's Mate 3rd Class Yaroslav Iventyev was driving a Maxda RX-7 when he left Russian Moscow Nights restaurant, just off University Boulevard South, after having dinner with friends. He was reported missing when he didn't show up for work the next day at NAS Jacksonville.

His disappearance remains on open case with the NCIS.

On Monday, police found bones of someone dead at least a year in woods across from the Avenues Mall.

"Any time you have this amount of personnel searching an area, you're going to find things you didn't know were there," Waldrup said. "I'm sure there's a possibility of finding some more."

"I said yesterday, when you look, you find," Hackney said in his Tuesday news conference on the search for Lonzie.