Cruise Ship Lawyers Blog
Last month, jokes circulated online surrounding Netflix’s Trainwreck: Poop Cruise and its nightmarish conclusion, however, the streaming platform’s newest documentary is far more chilling.
Amy Bradley Is Missing centers around the 1998 disappearance of 23-year-old Amy Lynn Bradley, of Virginia. Bradley embarked on a voyage with Royal Caribbean International’s Rhapsody of the Seas. What was meant to be a family trip with Bradley’s parents and her brother to Curaçao, quickly became a nightmare.
Just a few days into the trip, she vanished, leaving little clues behind. The documentary delves into the final hours leading up to her disappearance. Bradley allegedly drank until nearly 4 a.m. and slept on the cabin’s balcony. Though many suspected she must have somehow fallen from her balcony into the sea below, — an accident that effects nearly 20 people annually, according to data from the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) — passengers came forward claiming that they had seen her, tossing a wrench into the theory and raising questions about what truly happened.
Some passengers even claimed that they had seen her hours, months and years after she vanished. Though the FBI, which investigated the harrowing disappearance, investigated these claims, they could not definitively prove that Bradley was the woman these people had encountered.
Since then, online sleuths and spectators have revisited the case and presented new theories. In 2005, it was claims were made that Bradley had become a victim of human trafficking and has since been unable to escape after photos of a woman resembling her surfaced online. The FBI examined these photos and said the woman in the photos could be her, but did not give a definitive answer.
For the Bradley family, the Netflix documentary may be a new way to get their daughter’s face out into the public and help renew the sense of hope that they will one day be reunited.
“We all have this gut feeling that she’s out there,” Ronald “Brad” Bradley, Amy’s younger brother, says in the finale of the series. “The lack of closure, or the not knowing, allows us to continue to hope. So, I actually prefer it that way, other than the finality of having an answer.”
Leesfield & Partners
The Bradley’s case is wrenching and one that no family should ever have to go through. While there is no definitive data on the exact number of people who vanish annually from cruise ships each year, reports show that, as stated above, about 19 people go overboard every year for various reasons.
Just recently, a father made national headlines after he leapt overboard after his child fell through a porthole on their Disney Cruise. The two treaded water for about 20 minutes awaiting rescue. Thankfully, no serious injuries were reported in that instance.
A previous case handled by Leesfield & Partners — a Florida-based personal injury law firm with nearly five decades of experience representing injured passengers and crew — did not end so lucky. In that case, a family was traveling on a cruise ship when they were separated from their young child. As the child approached an interior ship railing to lean and peer over it, she fell five stories to her death.
This horrific instance is sadly just one of many shocking wrongful death and injury cases involving cruise lines handled by Leesfield & Partners. Whether from an onboard injury stemming from improperly maintained cruise ship decks or due to the criminal acts of a third party, our skilled trial attorneys have worked diligently over the decades to secure the best possible outcome for every client.
In a previous case involving criminal activity, Leesfield & Partners represented a Canadian woman who was raped by a member of the ship’s crew. In that instance, the crewmember used an employee keycard to enter the woman’s isolated cabin where he launched his violent attack.
Our attorneys secured a confidential amount for the woman in that case.
Leesfield & Partners is handing an ongoing case involving video voyeurism. This case is being led by Bernardo Pimentel II, a Trial Attorney at the firm. In this case, a cruise ship employee with access to the private cabins of passengers was planting hidden cameras to film passengers in their bathrooms. In addition to our client, many passengers were filmed, including children.
The employee was later sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for producing child sex abuse material.
Since the ordeal, our client has been left severely emotionally scarred.
“If we hold these carriers, these cruise lines … accountable for these kind of situations, they can now proactively seek out this misconduct and these people, these individuals that can commit these kind of actions against their passengers before it even occurs,” Mr. Pimentel told reporters when discussing the case.
Previous On Board Injury Cases
The firm recovered $2.5 million for a 9-year-old who collided with an unpadded steel grommet while diving for an out-of-bounds ball as he played on a ship’s basketball court. The child in that case suffered a catastrophic brain injury as a result on the traumatic incident.
Similarly, the firm represented a man, 62, who was injured while playing pickleball aboard his cruise ship. The firm settled the case for $500,000.
Partner Justin B. Shapiro and Trial Attorney Evan Robinson secured a confidential amount for a woman who was injured after an onboard fall. In that case, the woman slipped on water that was not cleaned up by crew in a timely manner. As a result, the woman fractured her right femur and fractured one of the bones in her lumbar spine.
Mr. Pimentel is also representing another woman in a case involving an injury she suffered while coming back to her cruise. The woman was returning from a shore excursion when she tripped and fell on an uneven bridge, seriously injured her left ankle, knee, arm and elbow. She was able to walk back to the tender boat where she informed the crew she would need to see the ship’s physician.
No action was taken to ensure that medical personnel would be there to meet her when she arrived. She disembarked without assistance and, while walking up the gangway, paused to gather herself while in extreme pain. She told the crew she needed immediate medical attention. The crew, again, failed to provide a wheelchair or another means of transport to the infirmary. While still on the gangway, crew members approached our client and grabbed her arm. She fell to the floor in agony and was finally given a wheelchair and taken to the infirmary.
While there, she was diagnosed with multiple fractures to her hip and shoulder. Hours later, she was transferred to a remote hospital in Brazil and was left to wait a full week with insufficient medical care before she could be transported to a larger city and then to the U.S. for a full hip replacement.
She spent weeks recovering at a hospital in Florida before she was able to return to her home in another state.
