Naya Rivera‘s four-year-old son Josey Hollis Dorsey has been reunited with his father Ryan Dorsey, less than a day after the 33-year-old actress went missing while on a boat trip with the boy. The former Glee star look a pontoon boat out on Southern California’s Lake Piru, and never returned from a swim in the water according to the little one. He was found alone on the boat with his life jacket still on around 4pm on July 8. The following day, Josey looked happy in his daddy’s arms, as Ryan cuddled him close in photos while leaving Naya’s sister Nickayla Rivera‘s home in Valencia, CA. That’s about 20 miles from the lake where Naya vanished and is presumed drowned.
Former Southland star Ryan, 36, was wearing a dark t-shirt, a baseball cap and aviator sunglasses as he carried his son on his hip. Josey had his arms around his dad, wearing a white t-shirt and a black and white marble patterned bandana. In one photo, the preschooler flashed a bright smile as he held on to his father, seeming to be unaware of what has now become a recovery search for his mom’s body.
Naya took Josey on a boat trip around 1pm on July 8, which was a hot summer day and on a lake where the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department spokesman said she’d been been on previous occasions. Sgt. Kevin Donoghue said in a July 9 news conference that “The video shows from the dock and it shows the two of them departing on the boat.” A passing boater later found Josey alone on the north end of the lake about three hours later, with the boat unanchored and drifting, and no sign of Naya.
“We’ve had no indication after talking to her son that Ms. Rivera made it to shore. So the focus of our search efforts are in the water at this time,” Donoghue told reporters, adding that Josey, “gave enough information to investigators to conclude that his mother never made it out of the water.” The little boy reportedly told detectives that he and his mom went swimming, but that she never made it back aboard the boat.
A search and rescue effort from the air and in the lake began late in the afternoon of July 8 after a 911 caller reported finding Josey all alone on the boat with his “mother nowhere to be found.” It was suspended when nightfall came, due to poor visibility. On July 9 the search resumed at first light, but by midday had become a “recovery” mission to find Naya’s body after she was presumed to have drowned.
“We’re putting forth our best foot forward to try and locate her. We’re using all the assets that are available to us…We have experts who have dove this lake, who know it inside and out, who know where debris pockets might be. So, we’re going to do everything we can to find her. We’re going to continue to search,” Donoghue told the media.
Naya and Ryan dated in 2010 before breaking up but remaining friends. She went on to become engaged to rapper Big Sean in Oct. 2013, but they called off their July 2014 wedding just three months prior to the nuptials. Naya then reconnected with her pal Ryan and friendship turned to love. They ended up tying the knot on July 19, 2014 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, the same date which she was originally scheduled to wed Big Sean. The couple welcomed their only child Josey in Sept. 2015 and sadly split up in 2017. The pair divorced two years later, and shared custody of Josey, with Naya having primary physical custody.