Dear Captain Angil,
Hi, my name is Kimberly Hatcher and I have a question. A few years ago I took a cruise on a ship to the West Indies and the Caribbean and during the cruise one of the passengers was murdered. Actually, I think he was what they call a guest lecturer. The man who did it was eventually caught or killed before we got back to Miami, but the scuttlebutt (is this the right word?) on the ship was that a special detective had been flown in by helicopter to take charge of the investigation. Nobody really knew who he was, and I don't believe I ever saw him, or if I did, he certainly didn't stand out as a super sleuth or anything. The ship's staff kept everything so hush-hush, we just went about our business on the cruise and never really thought much about the passenger who got killed or who the murderer was.
Anyway, my question is this, do they really have a special investigator who they send in to do this sort of thing? And if so, why? Can't they just have the cops or the ship's crew do it?
Thanks.
Kim
PS. I accidentally found your blog while Googling "Murder at Sea."
Hi KIm, yes, scuttlebutt's the right word, and yes, they do have a guy they send in. It's not me, although I wish it were. Sounds like a great gig.
ReplyDeleteThe two main problems with major crimes like murder on a ship at sea, in international waters, is, first of all, jurisdiction. Even if the ship is at port, there are still jurisdiction issues if the crime takes place on board the ship. (If it takes place on the land, on sovereign soil, that's a bit different.) Secondly, a crime scene on a ship at sea essentially disappears when the ship reaches its final destination. How are you going to ask thousands of passengers to stick around for interviews? They all have connecting flights, etc., and have to get hoe, and the vast majority of them don't know a thing.
Lastly, the ship's security staff are not trained investigators. They're mostly security specialists, and they have no forensic discovery capability.
So this is why there is a guy who does this sort of thing. I don't know who he is but I know he exists, because I run pilots to and from cruise ships in the summer and fall and the ship captains have spoken of him, a guy who kind of "blends in" to the cruise scene and who you would never know was investigating a murder or other major crime at sea.
Hope this helps. -- G.
Salt air, open bar, fine dining, bikinis, night life. And those little bags of salted nuts they have in every one of the minibars. What can be bad?
ReplyDeleteH.G.
Kim,
ReplyDeleteWere you the one with the green string bikini? I remember you out there on the lounge chair staring out into the sea as we left Martinique. You were drinking a gimlet and reading a magazine, Popular Mechanics, I think it was. In any case, yeah, that was my fine self who investigated that murder. I got my man, but you know what I'll remember most about that cruise? You in that green string bikini.
Henry Grave