By Seamus McGraw
(Crime Library) - Five months after newlywed George Allen Smith IV vanished in a creeping cloud of mystery during a honeymoon cruise off the coast of Turkey, authorities remain tightlipped about their investigation.
But in recent weeks, the widow of the young Connecticut man and his family, have begun to speak out, insisting in various television interviews that there is no longer any question in their minds that Smith was the victim of foul play. The grieving family also alleges, among other things that the Royal Caribbean cruise line has engaged in a systematic effort to erase traces of the crime, perhaps, family members have speculated, compromising the investigation in the process.
Neither the Smith family, nor their attorney, Brett Rivkind, who are reportedly planning a lawsuit against the cruise line, immediately returned telephone calls. But in a telephone interview Wednesday, representatives of Royal Caribbean insisted that the cruise line had acted both conscientiously and with compassion to the widow, and insisted that the FBI sanctioned the actions they took in the aftermath of Smith's disappearance.
Smith vanished on July 5, ten days after his wedding, while cruising the eastern Mediterranean between Greece and Turkey. Though few details of the investigation have been released, by all accounts, both Smith and his widow, Jennifer Hagel Smith, had been actively enjoying the amenities aboard ship. They gambled nightly, though neither authorities nor the cruise line would comment on how well they did at the tables. "That's part of the investigation," a cruise line spokeswoman said.
There were also reports of raucous behavior. On one occasion, a fellow passenger registered a complaint about noise coming from the area around Smith's cabin.
Officials aboard the ship later said that they discovered the man was missing and began a shipboard search for both Smith and his wife. They found her in a shipboard spa.
He was presumed to have fallen overboard and drowned.
But an investigation, turned up troubling evidence that perhaps there was more to Smith's case. Bloodstains were found on an awning and along a handrail leading away from Smith's cabin and a blood handprint was found on the side of the ship.
In recent interviews for various television crime talk shows, Smith's family has alleged that the cruise line quickly sanitized the scene. Among other things, it has been alleged that a metal awning that had been streaked with blood, had been painted.
But in an interview this week with Crime Library, Royal Caribbean spokeswoman Lynn Martenstein insisted that the cruise line had not compromised any evidence.
"The metal overhang, which is what you're referring to, was never painted," Martenstein said, "it was power-hosed off," hours after Smith's disappearance was reported to Turkish investigations, and "only after the Turkish authorities had finished their investigation and given us explicit permission to do so." Witnesses have confirmed that the overhang was cleaned hours after the initial investigation began.
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