Overview
- U.S. Coast Guard divers arrived to the Sea of Abaco on Tuesday to search new, GPS-guided sites about 25 feet deep after Bahamian authorities granted permission.
- Federal investigators have framed the probe as a possible foreign murder of a U.S. national and are working under the statute that covers such cases.
- Forensic extraction of GPS and location data from devices linked to Brian Hooker did not match his account and led authorities to previously unsearched areas.
- The couple’s U.S.-flagged sailboat Soulmate was seized by the Coast Guard Investigative Service and is being forensically and digitally examined in Florida.
- No one has been charged, Lynette Hooker’s body has not been recovered, and investigators face the technical and legal hurdles of a no-body maritime case while using DNA from relatives and digital evidence.