The yacht at the center of American boater Lynette Hooker’s disappearance in the Bahamas has been seized by the US Coast Guard and is now being held in Florida.
Soulmate left Marsh Harbour on the island of Great Abaco on Friday, but appears to have been intercepted on its way to the Sunshine State’s east coast the following day.
It is understood to have been sailed from the Bahamas by two men – neither of them Lynette’s 58-year-old husband Brian, who was released after five days in custody and is still being investigated in connection to his missing wife.
The development comes just over a month after Hooker claimed Lynette, 55, was swept off their tiny dinghy in rough seas as they made their way to the anchored 50ft yacht from a boozy dinner on the island of Elbow Key.
He told Bahamas police their outboard engine’s kill switch was attached to Lynette when she was pitched into the shark-infested waters, cutting his power and ability to rescue her.
Soulmate is now being held in Fort Pierce where Coast Guard investigators have been searching it since Sunday morning for any other clues surrounding Hooker’s version of events, a source told the Daily Mail.
Lynette’s daughter from an earlier relationship, Karli Aylesworth, revealed the boat’s new status in a heart-rending Mother’s Day message on Facebook on Sunday.
‘The boat has moved, by two men. Neither of them are Brian. Never seen them before,’ said the 29-year-old.
Lynette Hooker, 55, has been missing since April 4 after disappearing in waters near Elbow Cay in the Bahamas. Her husband, Brian Hooker, told authorities she fell overboard from a dinghy
‘The boat has moved, by two men. Neither of them are Brian. Never seen them before,’ said Lynette’s daughter
Soulmate (pictured) left Marsh Harbour on the island of Great Abaco on Friday, but appears to have been intercepted on its way to the Sunshine State’s east coast the following day
‘And they turned off their GPS. Last it shows them in the middle of the ocean next to the Bahamas up towards Florida or up the east coast. But I think they’re going to Florida.
The US Coast Guard would not confirm details when contacted by the Daily Mail, but did say it was a ‘pending investigation’.
Hooker’s attorney in the Bahamas, Terrel Butler, also refused to confirm anything, citing the ongoing probe.
Police in the Bahamas freed Hooker after two intensive interview sessions and allowed him to return to the United States, where he is understood to have headed to his sick mother in California.
However, a senior officer told the Daily Mail shortly after he was freed that the husband remained a suspect, adding: ‘Our officers continue to work this case… the matter is still being investigated.’
The Hookers, married for 25 years and from Onsted, Michigan, were four years into a voyage they were documenting on social media that had started in Texas and drifted to the Bahamas via Florida when tragedy struck.
They left the waterfront Abaco Inn on Elbow Key around 7.30pm in fading light on April 4 to head to Soulmate, anchored about a mile away.
The Hookers, married for 25 years and from Onsted, Michigan, were four years into a voyage they were documenting on social media that had started in Texas and drifted to the Bahamas via Florida when tragedy struck
Brian Hooker, 59, right, has maintained his innocence and insists his wife, Lynette, fell overboard in rough conditions on the water
Brian and Lynette were drinking at Abaco Inn (pictured) before taking the dignhy back to the Soulmate
After Lynette went overboard from the 8ft dinghy, Hooker said she was blown away from him in the gusty conditions. He subsequently took nearly eight hours to paddle to safety on the neighboring island of Great Abaco, he said.
Butler had previously told The Daily Mail: ‘He categorically and unequivocally denies any wrongdoing.’
However, local experts told the Daily Mail they were skeptical of Hooker’s version of events, pointing to what they said were puzzling inconsistencies that could reveal mysterious ‘missing hours’.
Hooker was first spotted after Lynette went missing at 3.35am on April 5 on security surveillance footage at Marsh Harbour Boat Yard – some four miles from where Lynette vanished.
He had tied up the dinghy half a mile south in an area called Calcutta and walked over dangerously rocky shoreline terrain and through dense mangrove before reaching the yard.
The footage, which is in the hands of the Royal Bahamas Police and has not been released, has been seen by the Daily Mail.
It revealed Hooker wandering almost nonchalantly around the yard wearing a blue shirt, dark shorts, flip flops and with a cowboy-style hat perched squarely on his head.
In the footage, He walked up to security fencing and raised his arms to attract attention, but there appears little sign of panic.
Brian Hooker is back in the United States with his sick mother after being released from police custody
Brian Hooker told ABC News his ‘sole focus’ was to continue searching for his wife ‘no matter how likely or unlikely that is.’ He left the Bahamas shortly after this interview, above
The husband, wearing a yellow ‘dry bag’ to keep items free of water damage, calls out: ”Hello, I need help. Hello. Help me.’ At another point he also casually glances down at his watch.
But at no time in the sections of footage seen by the Daily Mail does he immediately raise the alarm about his missing wife.
When he calls out, he doesn’t appear to be yelling. There is no apparent sign of panic, of desperation, of urgency or of alarm for missing Lynette. He could, of course, have been exhausted.
Night security guard Edward Smith found Hooker and told The Daily Mail the husband said he’d used one paddle to battle his way to safety for nearly eight hours in heavy seas and high winds.
But Hooker’s demeanor on the footage has raised eyebrows among several people in Marsh Harbour who have a close connection to the case, who have also seen the video and have talked to The Daily Mail.
‘That’s a very strange way for someone to behave when they’ve just seen their wife swept away to their almost certain death,’ said one of them, a highly experienced local mariner.
‘He seems casual, nothing frantic there at all, not much to suggest what has happened. And what about his wife? He doesn’t seem to be raising any kind of alarm.’
‘Also, I really don’t understand the cowboy hat. He’s been through such an ordeal and he has time, or even the thought, to put on that hat?’
Security guard Smith said Hooker told him: ‘My wife was thrown out of the boat.’
‘We were drinking, we were drunk. I should have known better. I shouldn’t have done it”.
Smith told us: ‘But he then added, “whatever happened, happened. The wind was blowing so hard when it happened she just went over.”‘
‘Mr Hooker said he was trying to paddle to get back towards the lady. But he said he only had one paddle and the wind was so strong it blew him away from her in the dark. So he couldn’t see where she was.
‘He said the last time he saw her she was swimming towards Hope Town on Elbow Key, but it was so dark he could not be clear. He then lost sight of her.
Brian and Lynette Hooker are seen alongside her daughter, Karli Aylesworth, right
Authorities continue to investigate the disappearance but Lynette Hooker has not been found
‘I asked him, where’s your wife now? He said, she’s still in the water. I immediately stopped talking and called 911 and they called the police, who arrived ten minutes later.’
‘He wasn’t crying or anything. He didn’t seem stressed in that way. There wasn’t a lot of emotion. There were no tears,’ Smith added.
‘He expressed nothing that you would imagine in those circumstances. He was more exhausted than emotional.’
Hooker’s claim of spending eight hours on the water also raised eyebrows with local experts.
‘The winds were up to 25 mph, which means that dinghy would be moving at least two to three miles an hour in the direction of Marsh Harbour,’ one expert told The Daily Mail.
‘I’d say it would cover the distance to where Hooker beached in two hours, maybe even an hour and a half.’
‘I don’t see where eight hours comes from. Obviously I wasn’t there, but to me there are missing hours which need to be explained,’ the expert said.
