A 29-year-old man who died after getting into trouble in the water at Kaiate Falls on New Year's Day has been identified by police.
The man has been named as Quincy Anthony Gaskin from the Omanawa area of Western Bay of Plenty.
In Saturday's Bay of Plenty Times, a friend of the deceased man, who did not want to be identified, told the paper the friends had gone down to the falls for a swim to freshen up on New Year's Day.
He said his friend had been sitting in the water, "about waist deep - happily laughing".
"He went out to the edge and it [the water level] got up to his chest and then he could no longer feel the bottom.