This browser does not support the Video element.
Wisconsin DNR uses restitution from kayaker who faked death
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced on Wednesday, July 15, the restitution received as part of a 2025 Green Lake County Circuit Court ruling against a kayaker who staged his death was used to purchase new sonar equipment for emergency response to public safety incidents and natural resource protection cases. Ryan Borgwardt staged a boating fatality on Big Green Lake, the state’s deepest inland lake, back in August 2024. Almost two months later, authorities determined he had fled the country and falsified his death for personal reasons. Green Lake County Sheriff and other law enforcement partners located Borgwardt in Europe and convinced him to return to Green Lake.
MADISON, Wis. - The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has used its restitution money from the kayaker who staged his own death on Big Green Lake back in August 2024 to purchase new sonar equipment.
Big Green Lake incident | August 2024
The backstory:
Ryan Borgwardt staged his own death on Big Green Lake back in August 2024. Almost two months later, authorities learned he had fled the country and falsified his death for personal reasons. Green Lake County Sheriff and other law enforcement partners located Borgwardt in Europe and convinced him to return to Wisconsin.
The court ordered Borgwardt to pay restitution to the DNR for its about 350 hours of staff time spent searching for him.
FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android
Green Lake kayaker faked death; man shares story in interrogation
Ryan Borgwardt, the Wisconsin kayaker who admitted to faking his death, shared his story during a law enforcement interrogation in December.
What they're saying:
"You know, we go into them with the expectation of there's a family on shore looking at us to find answers for them and make a recovery and bring them closure," said DNR Marine Warden Adam Strehlow. "So, when a lot of the time is spent to do something like that, and it turns out that it's not the case, very frustrating. However, I guess if something good came out of it, yeah, some funding to help us buy two different towfish units to have one in the south part of the state and one in the north part of state. I guess that's the silver lining."
New sonar equipment
What we know:
The DNR used about $9,000 of the funds to purchase a device called a towfish sonar. The unit can map the bottom of waterbodies for missing persons, items, and hazards.
Within weeks of use, the towfish has already been deployed to four missions and located two missing people. The DNR says the use of these highly sophisticated, remote tools helps maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of underwater searches and reduces the need to expose public safety divers to risky recoveries involving scenarios such as significant depths or entanglement.
What they're saying:
"So with the new device, the towfish, it's a sonar that is deployed off the back of a patrol boat. It's on a tether that goes down," added Strehlow. "You can bring it down to the bottom of the lake. We usually keep it about five to 10 feet off and that emits sonar out on either side, which then echoes off objects on the bottom and then returns to us and then the computer converts into an image that we can read. So, as we're going back and forth on a lake on a grid pattern searching, we're covering several hundred feet at a time and finding targets that we believe could be victims or other items that we're looking for, and then we can go and explore those targets with the ROV and oftentimes locate and recover whatever we're looking for."
SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News
The DNR says the remote tools also support other essential mission sets for wardens and have been used to ensure critical infrastructure protection, respond to environmental spills and protect Wisconsin’s submerged cultural resources, such as the many shipwrecks covering the Lake Michigan beds.
Learn more about the work of the conservation wardens on the DNR’s Division of Public Safety and Resource Protection webpage.
The Source: The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) sent FOX6 a news release. FOX6 has also extensively covered the case involving Ryan Borgwardt. FOX6 also interviewed DNR Marine Warden Adam Strehlow.