Body found in Inner Harbor vehicle identified as missing man from 2014

A submerged minivan off East Pratt Street has finally been linked to Franklin Roosevelt Daniels, a man missing from Waldorf since December 2014, but the central questions in the case are still unanswered: how the vehicle ended up in the Inner Harbor, why it went undiscovered for so long, and what caused Daniels’ death.

Baltimore police identified Daniels after his body was recovered from the vehicle pulled from the water on July 24, 2025. The car had been found about 22 feet underwater near the 500 block of East Pratt Street, behind the National Aquarium and the Pier IV area, during a Baltimore City Fire Department marine and dive training operation. The Baltimore Police Department Underwater Recovery Team later used tow lines to bring the vehicle out of the harbor.

The vehicle was identified as a Honda Odyssey minivan with Silver Taxi Cab Service markings from Waldorf. Local reporting said it showed signs of long-term water exposure, including shattered windows, reinforcing investigators’ belief that it had been submerged for years before crews reached it. What began as a waterfront recovery near one of Baltimore’s most visible landmarks turned into a missing-person case stretching back more than 11 years into Charles County.

For Daniels’ family, the identification provides a name and a timeline after years of uncertainty. For investigators, it leaves the hardest parts of the case unresolved. Police have not determined a definitive cause or manner of death, and the case remains under investigation.

The recovery also highlights the challenge of detecting submerged vehicles in a busy urban harbor where daily traffic, tourism and constant waterfront activity can hide evidence for years. In this case, a routine training operation on the harbor floor exposed a vehicle tied not only to Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, but to a missing man from Waldorf whose disappearance had gone unanswered since 2014.