Wisconsin kayaker who faked his death and fled the country is charged after returning to US

Associated Press

GREEN LAKE, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin man who faked his own drowning and left his wife and three children for Eastern Europe willingly returned to the U.S. after four months and was charged Wednesday with obstructing an intense lake search for his body.

The criminal complaint charging Ryan Borgwardt with misdemeanor obstruction offers a detailed account of how the 45-year-old pulled off his disappearance, including how he struggled to emerge from the water, almost didn’t make it through customs on his way overseas and was living in the country of Georgia when he realized he had left too many clues behind.

Police said Borgwardt turned himself in to authorities at the Green Lake County sheriff’s office in Wisconsin on Tuesday. A judge entered a not-guilty plea on his behalf during a brief court hearing on Wednesday afternoon. He was released on $500 bail, although he would only have to pay that amount if he misses a future court date.

Borgwardt told Judge Mark Slate that he would represent himself going forward since he has only $20 in his wallet. The judge advised he could get a court-appointed lawyer but didn’t name one for him.

It’s unclear what Borgwardt plans to do now. His parents were in court, but he was led out by bailiffs after the proceeding ended without speaking to them. Bailiffs escorted the couple out through a rear door to avoid waiting reporters.

Borgwardt was reported missing on Aug. 12. According to a criminal complaint, Borgwardt told investigators that he had been researching how to disappear, studying lake deaths and how deep a body has to sink so it won’t resurface.

He attended church with his family on the morning of Aug. 11 and then put his plan into motion that night, driving 50 miles (80 kilometers) from his home in Watertown to Green Lake. Sheriff Mark Podoll said Borgwardt told investigators he picked Green Lake because it’s the deepest lake in Wisconsin.

He paddled his kayak to the middle of the lake, inflated a raft he brought with him, overturned the kayak and paddled back to shore in the raft, dumping his cell phone and a tackle box with other identification in the lake on the way, according to the complaint.

Borgwardt said “he had to make this believable so that everyone, including law enforcement, would think he drowned in the lake,” the complaint said.

He told investigators he struggled to get out of the lake, sinking into waist-deep muck. Worried that police would find his muddy footprints, he tried to wash them off the road before retrieving an electric bike he had stashed nearby. He traveled 70 miles (112 kilometers) through the night to Madison, where he caught a bus to the Toronto airport.

He said he barely got through Canadian customs because he didn’t have his driver’s license, which he had thrown in the lake. He eventually boarded a flight to Paris and then to an unspecified country in Asia.

After landing in that country, a woman picked him up. They spent a couple days in a hotel, and he later took up residency in the country of Georgia, according to the complaint and a probable cause statement.

Investigators contacted Borgwardt through information they found on a laptop he left behind, including a photo of the woman he traveled to meet. He told investigators he had to leave the laptop behind to make his death believable but left too much information on it, according to the complaint.

Podoll said in November that investigators found passport photos, inquiries about moving funds to foreign banks and communication with a woman from Uzbekistan. They also discovered that Borgwardt took out a $375,000 life insurance policy in January. Podoll has said the policy was for his family.

The sheriff’s office has said the search for Borgwardt’s body lasted more than a month and cost at least $35,000. Borgwardt told investigators he often checked the news for updates on his disappearance and thought the search would last only a few weeks, according to the complaint.

Borgwardt told investigators that he knew police would find him but he wanted to delay their efforts for as long as he could, according to the complaint.

Podoll announced in November that investigators had made contact with Borgwardt and were “pulling at his heartstrings” to come home.

The sheriff told reporters during a news conference Wednesday morning that Borgwardt returned to the U.S. willingly and turned himself at the sheriff’s office in the Green Lake County Government Center on Tuesday afternoon. He declined to detail Borgwardt’s return trip, saying only that “he got on an airplane.” He also declined to elaborate on what drove Borgwardt to return.

“That’s going to be up to him someday,” the sheriff said. “We’re not going to release that. … We brought a dad back on his own.”

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This story has been updated to correct the name of the center where Ryan Borgwardt turned himself in. It is the Green Lake County Government Center, not the Green Lake County Justice Center.

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Associated Press writer Ed White in Detroit contributed to this report.