(NewsNation) — A police chief in Costa Rica maintains that Malcolm-Jamar Warner, 54, was trying to save his daughter, who was also in the water, at the time of his drowning.
Chief of the Tourist Police of the Atlantic Region Elberth León told Us Weekly that he knows what he saw when arriving at the scene.
“The Red Cross also treated the girl [on site] and she didn’t need to go to the clinic,” León said.
Conflicting statements on Malcolm-Jamal Warner’s death
Costa Rica’s Subdelegation of Bribri of the Judicial Investigation Agency challenged León’s claim that the “The Cosby Show” actor died trying to save his child, US Weekly reports.
“It appears that at one point, Mr. Warner was playing with his daughter at the shoreline,” the agency said. “He later left her out of the water and supposedly entered the sea along with a friend. It was at that moment that the current pulled them in; the friend managed to get out, but unfortunately, Mr. Warner did not.”
The Costa Rican Red Cross spokesperson said a second individual was hospitalized following the incident.
The unidentified person was a 29-year-old man from Nicaragua, who was “swept away by a current” as he was trying to save Warner, according to PEOPLE.
León told US Weekly that he was confused by OIJ’s statement since they weren’t “present at the scene.”
“They interviewed Malcom’s family, but they also weren’t there at the time of the accident,” he said.
Warner died in Costa Rica on July 20 after getting caught in a current at Playa Cocles in Limon on the country’s Caribbean coast, Costa Rican authorities confirmed. He was on a family vacation at the time, according to People.
