When McCormick, a corporate finance analyst at SunTrust Bank in Atlanta, was reported missing, the caller said he was last seen down by a dock at the residence and it was suspected he might have fallen into the water, according to Maj. William Webb, chief deputy at the Lancaster Sheriff’s Office.

But investigators eventually concluded that McCormick, who was found in the water nearly 2 miles from the dock of the home where he had been staying, instead died following a boating accident that involved a 1999 Boston Whaler powerboat registered to Gary Hooper, John Randolph Hooper’s father.

The elder Hooper, a Richmond native and former senior vice president at the commercial real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield | Thalhimer, had been in Africa traveling at the time of the incident, Webb said.

Authorities said the boat struck a bulkhead in the water. When he was pulled from the water, McCormick had a cut and scratches to the left side of his head and face, the sheriff’s office said in court papers.

The state medical examiner’s office said McCormick’s death was caused by drowning and that his death was accidental, but the sheriff’s office has said it is awaiting a final autopsy report in the case before coming to that conclusion.