Inside the murky world of the cruise ship industry | 60 Minutes Australia

this fall to us is floating pleasure domes luxury hotels on the sea where every day is perfect and the party never stops but scratch the surface of the cruise ship industry and the truth isn't so dazzling behind the pina coladas and the smiles lies a murky world of sexual assault drugs and violence even murder incredibly one passenger goes missing overboard every two weeks now you'd think the big cruise companies would be desperate to get their industry shipshape you couldn't be more wrong [Music] on a balmy Brisbane afternoon the Pacific Sun set sail the very picture of pleasure that the cruise ship industry likes to portray so you can see them all over the right can't give him away the 18 hundred passengers on board are looking forward to a three-day break from the worries of everyday life but they're oblivious to the risks they could be sailing into if you thought up the better be playing the drinks will do flowing could be could be a fantastic cruise or could turn into a nightmare Jeff table jockey has seen that nightmare firsthand the former P&O security guard spent ten years mopping up the mayhem on cruisers and he gave evidence at the inquest into australia's most notorious cruise ship death that of Diane Brimble when you've got lots of alcohol and people on the holiday enjoying himself having a good time there's always that chance of something going wrong or someone doing something stupid what sort of crimes did you have to deal with toxication domestic violence man overboard sexual assaults it was constantly there was fights all the time in the nightclubs and the bars deaths when the Costa Concordia ran aground off the coast of Italy in January 32 people were left dirt and the sinister underbelly of this glamorous world was exposed again the thirty billion dollar industry is largely controlled by just three global companies and we traveled from Brisbane to Britain and the Bahamas to investigate them with the thousands of people on this ship and the millions who take cruises every year aren't told is that if they fall victim to a crime on board they can expect little help from the cruise companies and virtually nothing from any police force the fact is a ship on the high seas is as good as law I don't think and the whole doesn't go Mike and Anne Koreans daughter Rebecca vanished from a cruise ship in March last year the 24 year old had been working as a children's supervisor on board Disney Wonder we got the phone call on the Tuesday nights at court to 11 yeah from Disney to say that the back was missing at sea how do you deal with a phone call like that still very painful isn't it still think about it every day that's just awful that's nightmare really that was the start of it Rebecca was captured on the ship's security cameras at 6:00 a.m. making a phone call she walked around to the corner and was never seen again a line sandal on the level 6 deck is all that was ever found did you get the sense from Disney that solving Rebecca's disappearance was a priority first I think they were going through the motions with us Rebecca is one of 200 cruise ship passengers to be lost overboard in the past decade an astonishing rate of roughly one every fortnight but what's even more incredible is the way these disappearances are investigated Rebecca's case wasn't handled by police in the US or the UK but the place where the vessel was registered in the Bahamas this isn't why this is not proper investigation that's all that really isn't you know it's just a case of they do what they have to do that's it gloss over it that's it a single Bahamian police officer was sent to LA for one day to to get Rebecca's disappearance he spent just a few hours on board the ship collected no forensic evidence and spoke to none of the passengers or crew the Koreans were promised that police report within two or three weeks that was nearly a year ago it is not true that the Disney Corporation wanted this to go away we approached the us-based cruise company Disney for an interview they refused and referred us to this man Michael cry hired gun and a spokesman behind whom the cruise companies hide Disney had an option in the Rebecca khorium case to go to the FBI go to Scotland Yard and they instead chose a lone police officer from the Royal Bahamas police force to investigate the disappearance potentially murder of one of their employees my understanding of the Rebecca corium case is that the United Kingdom was notified that they were not that the Bahamas were notified that the United States government was notified see I would say that everything you just put to me is not true well you know I have been I have been called a liar before but not based upon the information in belief that I put forward which I believe is true back on the Pacific Sun Dawn paints its way across the Pacific Ocean it's a tranquil start to day two but what passengers don't know is that if a crime is committed out on the high seas it won't necessarily be investigated by Australian police that's because the Pacific Sun is registered sixteen thousand kilometres away in Malta do you think they have any idea that if something goes wrong on board that ship that a police officer from a third world country is going to be sent over to investigate I don't know whether they know that or not [Music] nothing has rocked the Australian cruise ship industry so violently as the death of diam Brimble in 2002 less than 24 hours after boarding the pno Pacific sky the 42 year old mother of three was dead she'd been drugged her naked body found in the cabin of four men incredibly there wasn't one conviction it was just a complete sham Mazal completes your model the crime scene was tampered with no one should have been led into that cabin whatsoever that was a crime scene ten years later Jeff Taub Jackie believes nothing has really changed when a crime is committed do the cruise ship companies investigate properly no far from it far from it they want to push that under the carpet and just get on with business they don't want that they don't tarnish their reputation out of all the crimes you saw how many convictions never Elessar never seen one conviction it sounds like being on a cruise ship on the high seas is the perfect place to commit a crime you'd probably get away with it Allison you'd probably get away with it [Music] so I was just in my room alone and just resting January one last year Tina and her mother Andy are on a 17 day Australian cruise on the Royal Caribbean ship Rhapsody of the Seas the 15 year old is taking enough alone in her cabin I heard like the door open the guy was wearing a crew uniform the door closed behind him and that's when I kind of like almost froze what followed was a nightmarish sexual assault not by another passenger but by a crew member pretty much the entire time I was crying and closing my eyes and trying to think that they nothing was really happening pretty tough to listen to Andy how do you feel when you hear that it affects me all the time I just feel like I never let my car down raising my kids Royal Caribbean ex to no help in trying to find Tina's alleged attacker and the company refused to talk to us what happened to Tina does that shock you no that doesn't shock me at all because these crew members have access to these cabins whether it be from cabin stewards to the bar staff doing mini bars they have access to these areas until now the global nature of the cruise ship industry it's many jurisdictions and ambiguous borders has made it all the more difficult to control but khane kaba has taken up the fight you've taken on a very powerful industry I'm not intimidated by anybody there needs to be independent security on a cruise ship what city in the world if they got 300 people or a thousand doesn't have an independent policeman so if a crime occurs action is taken every place except on a cruise ship the reason for king-chavez crusade is the mysterious disappearance of his daughter Marion while she was on a cruise to Alaska in 2004 even though the crew noted she was missing nothing was done no one was told and at the end of the voyage Marion's belongings of a simply thrown away that was the worst day of my life when I'd realized from the beginning that they knew and had lied to us you know and and covered everything up what why would somebody cover up we're not looking for a piece of lost baggage we're looking for a daughter for kin and for the corium 'he's the ultimate hope is that those who go on cruises get the same protection at sea as they would on land and that other families don't have to endure the endless churn of questions they must face every day do you think you'll ever find out what happened to Rebecca hopefully we'll find out one day who don't just disappear do you off a ship without anybody seeing anything somebody somebody shipped over something we know that don't we yeah hello I'm Tara brown thanks for watching to keep up with the 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Channel: 60 Minutes Australia

Views: 917,826

Rating: 4.7463369 out of 5

Keywords: 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes Australia, Liz Hayes, Charles Wooley, Tara Brown, Liam Bartlett, Allison Langdon, Tom Steinfort, Karl Stefanovic, Ray Martin, Gerald Stone, Sarah Abo, cruise industry, cruise ships, cruising, ships of shame, disappearances off cruise ships, disappearance from cruise ship, staff missing from cruise ship, overboard, passengers overboard, inside cruise ship industry, murder, violence on cruise ships, coronavirus on cruise ship, covid 19 on cruise ship

Id: jHeHgYgRVD0

Length: 12min 34sec (754 seconds)

Published: Thu May 21 2020