November 20, 2025 • 40 mins
Anna Kepner is on the Carnival Horizon on a 6-day cruise with her father, stepmother, and other family members.
Feeling sick at dinner, she excuses herself and goes to her cabin. When she doesn't show up for breakfast, the family goes to her cabin, but she is gone. A massive search of the 14-story floating city of 4,000-plus people is conducted without success.
At around 11 a.m., a maid finds Anna wrapped in a sheet, stuffed under a bed, and covered with a life jacket. Dead.
Joseph Scott Morgan and Dave Mack discuss the difficulty of investigating a death at sea on a cruise ship and try to find the truth of what happened to the 18-year-old cheerleader on the trip of a lifetime.
Transcribe Highlights
00:03.30 Introduction - claustrophobic
02:08.57 18-year-old found dead on cruise ship
05:12.17 Story has changed since it broke
10:18.26 FBI Involved
15:30.26 Info used in first reports
20:16.47 Who declared "death"
25:07.30 FBI responds with a lot of manpower
30:30.25 Who will be tasked with releasing information
35:41.67 Where does investigation start?
39:52.30 Conclusion - update coming soon
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Body dots, but Joseph's gotten more. I'm claustrophobic. I'll fully
admit that, I truly am. You know, that's one of
the reasons I had no desire. I had a couple
of buddies that joined the Navy. I had one body
that actually was a sub mariner, a nuclear guy, and
(00:23):
very bright right off those scales, and he now works
in the nuclear engineering industry. But you know that there's
something about being in the Navy, certainly being on a
sub where you're so confined. That's why I like the
Army so much. I'm not saying I'm the bravest guy,
but I always knew that I had someplace to escape
(00:45):
to on land. I ain't nowhere to run on a ship,
And to be honest, it's not something that really ever
attracts me. But there are thousands and thousands of people
year that bored cruise ships out of various ports, and
certainly those ports have become more buried now. Even in
(01:07):
my own hometown of New Orleans, there are several cruise
lines that leave out of the dock that's immediately adjacent
to the French Quarter. But you know, predominantly we're talking Florida, right,
And people go for a variety of reasons. But I
think that what people really want to do is escape,
to get out there, leave their cares behind, engorge themselves
(01:33):
on lovely food, perhaps have drink, sit by the pool,
and just be left alone. Maybe I've just stated my
ideal vacation. I'm not sure, but there is one family
right now that has questions. There's one family out there
that wants to understand how in the world did their
(01:55):
baby girl wind up at eighteen deceased on a cruise ship,
perhaps wrapped in a blanket and found by a maid
beneath a bed. Coming to you from the beautiful campus
of Jacksonville State University. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this
(02:20):
is Body Bags Day for anybody that follows me on
my social media. A lot of and you know this,
a lot of my photos. I love Instagram. I just
love it. I guess it's part of it's the warrior
in me. But I love taking pictures. Right. Most of
(02:44):
my images on my Instagram are me and Kimmy Sue
out on my pontoon boat cruising up and down the
Coosa River in northeast Alabama. It's beautiful right now, by
the way, you need to come join in some time.
That the leaves right now are just absolutely gorge and
there's you know, kind of mountainous terrain. It's high hills essentially.
(03:04):
It's not like the Rockies or anything. But the trees
are just screaming right now, so gorgeous, and you're there alone.
You're not going to run into like another car driving
up a mountain, you know, with the leafers like they
talk about up in New England. It's just gorgeous and
it's peaceful. But that's really the only cruising. I gotta
tell you something here I've never revealed to you before.
(03:25):
I have never been on a cruise. I've never been
on a cruise. Been on a lot of boats and
gone fishing a lot, but I have never been on
an ocean going vessel to cruise. I've been out in
blue water on a fishing boat, but never to cruise.
There's just something about it that's very, very confining to me.
I've just I don't know if I can, if I
(03:47):
could go and relax, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I have been.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
I've been tempted with trips, okay, doing it when you
do radio.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yeah, as long as I did.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
There's all kinds of promotions and there's always opportunities to
do things like that, to go on a cruise, and
it's all paid for me, which is awesome. I've never
wanted to do it. And my reason is real simple.
If I'm out on a boat and I don't feel well,
I want to go home. I want any I can't.
I'm not in charge. I'm stuck with everybody else. And
(04:20):
on top of that, there are some people that are crazy,
and even if you're on a boat with four thousand
other people, number three thirty nine ninety nine is going
to find me, and that crazy one is not going
to leave me alone. So you know, I'm perfectly fine
with never ever going on a cruise ship and just again.
So that's why whenever there's a story about a cruise ship,
(04:43):
I don't sit there and go see. That's why I
don't do it. I don't do my own personal psychotic reasons,
you know. I mean, I guess I'm a control free.
Everything about a cruise sounds fun to me. It sounds
like it would be a great vacation. It's an affordable
thing to whatever you want if you like to party,
you can party you like to you know, whatever you
want to do, you can do a board a cruise ship. Now, granted,
(05:03):
everything you do on a cruise ship you can do
on land without having to worry about somebody right next
door to you having a you know, a fiesta while
you're trying to have a siesta. At any rate, in
this particular case, we have a young girl, and well,
first of all, we got a convoluted story.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Joe, Yes, this story has changed.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
When we first got this, it was an eighteen year
old high school senior cheerleader who is planning to join
the arm of the Navy is on this cruise. There's
no mention of family, there's no mention of anything, and
we were looking at it because she all of a
(05:42):
sudden she dies on this boat alone. Right, that's the
original story and it's not anything like that. And we're
finding out things days into this. You're going, wait a minute,
the family was with her. We've already done this story
twice and we just now know the family was with it.
They're just admitis so, yeah, this story is bad. There's
(06:03):
something really really not good. And I don't mean that
in a mean way. I mean it in the way
that we're looking at a story. You've got an eighteen
year old girl who's dead, who went on a cruise.
She's a cheerleader in high school. This is the time
of her life. You're kicking off adulthood, you're getting ready,
and you die. And now we find out that her body.
(06:27):
Well we started off with she's missing. You know, you
go missing on a cruise ship. That's happened before. We've
had plenty of people. I mean, Amy Bradley comes to
mind because Netflix has a story on her right now.
I encourage you to watch that too. By the way,
Amy Bradley very well could have been in a house
of ill repute located right next door to Carlos and
(06:48):
Charlie's on her root. But when Natalie Holloway was there, Wow,
you know that's all part of that story too. And
Amy Bradley was on a cruise with her family and
she just in this case, we actually have an eighteen
year old who disappeared briefly, but they found her. And
(07:10):
I want to back up into this, Joe, because she
actually said she wasn't feeling well when they were at dinner, right.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, she did, And backing up even further this cruise.
Now they're from Titusville. Oh yeah, Titusville, Florida, which, by
the way, on the little side, one of my favorite
restaurants anywhere in Florida is actually in Titusville. It's a
place called Dixie Crossroads and they serve rock shrimp. It's
this amazing experience. You ever get a chance to go
(07:38):
down there and eat rock shrimp. It's really I hope
it's still in business. I might be endorsing something that
no longer exists, but yeah, the restaurant was really good.
That's what I know Titusville for and been there several
times over the years going to the east coast of Florida.
But thinking about this, the family is from Titusville, and
that's what two is like three hours by car from
(07:59):
ti us fell down to the Miami area, which is
actually where this cruise departed from. And I think they
left out of their day if I'm not mistaken, on
November the second, if memory serves me, so, on November second,
they've already been at sea now for four four days.
(08:21):
I don't know how many sleeps that would before sleeps maybe.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Well, you got to figure the carnival Horizon leaves Miami
on November second. On November sixth, they dock in Cosamel
and Anna leaves dinner feeling unwell. Now some of this
is even changing, Joe, some of the dates that we're hearing,
But let's just stick with this plan for right now,
(08:46):
because we've got it etched in stone for the moment.
The next morning, Anna does not join the family for breakfast.
Remember at dinner, I don't feel good. The next morning,
she doesn't show up for breakfast, and that they're like, well,
we need to go check on her. Now, at eighteen
year old enough to be in a room by yourself,
(09:07):
I guess she was there by herself. I don't know
if she was rooming with any of their family members
that were on the trip.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
Have you heard about that yet or no?
Speaker 1 (09:16):
I haven't. And that's what's so convoluted. And going back
to what you said earlier, Dave, I don't know if
you recall this. We were on another show together, and
on that show we had mentioned or it had been
mentioned that the grandparents were involved. Remember that was an
earlier iteration of this where they said that the grandparents
were taking her on this trip, right, this trip of
(09:39):
a lifetime. It was like a celebratory event for her
upcoming you know, graduation. She goes to a Christian school,
so it's private school, I guess, you know, And I
got scratched my head. Ohere, this thing seems like a
weird time of year to go on a cruise. And
you know, how do you get out of school to
do this. She's a senior. Maybe she's finished up all
of her core core work that she has to do,
(10:00):
and she's also to graduate. But what I'm saying is,
like you said, it's almost like a play where you
don't have a cast list and the players keep changing
with every new article that comes out of a newspaper somewhere.
So and not everybody's been forthcoming about this, and I'll
go ahead. The big reveal here is the fact that
the FEDS are involved in this because this happened in
(10:24):
international waters and so it's not like you're locked into
like a local constabulary where you might get more information.
As you well know, and I know I'm preaching the
choir to you, brother, the FBI is notoriously they're like Stonehenge,
you know, they just kind of sit there, you know,
and you're not going to get anything out of them, period,
(10:46):
and that can be rather frustrated, I know for people
you know that are interested in the news of this
case and whatnot. But that's kind of where we are.
So now people are left and the media's and looking
at you media. The media is out there trying to
piece this thing together and create their own narrative. What
(11:06):
we do know, though, is that she was in fact
in this room, and David, if I'm not mistaken, I
believe that she was not found by family. She was
found allegedly by maid.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
I'm assuming right, And I did want to address that
because you have the family we mentioned she didn't feel
well at dinner, and she retired from dinner and went
to her room and then did not come to breakfast
in the morning. They go to the room and look
and don't see anything, And so we're scouring the ship.
(11:40):
Now it's a big ship. There's four thousand people on
this ship. If I'm not mistaken, roughly give or take.
I mean, it's a small city.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Think about that. And when they start.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Looking for her, you're going to tear apart the room,
but not to the point of lifting anything up. You look,
because you're not assuming anything sinister. She just got maybe
she's met a boy and they're talking, and you know,
you're thinking innocent thoughts at that point. But it was
a maid that comes by to clean the room, I guess,
(12:15):
And that's when looking under the mattresses and other things.
Her body was found under the mattress under life preservers covered,
so she wasn't easy to see even if you lifted
the mattress up. But I got a feeling adding one
(12:37):
hundred plus pound body to an area that's not supposed
to have it is going to make it look different
on the outside.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Oh, of course it would. And you know, I checked out.
I went on and checked out the some of these
This is Carnival Cruise Lines, by the way, And as
you mentioned, the ship's name is the Horizon, and I
went and kind of did a little research about them.
Unlike some of these other ships within the fleet that
(13:06):
they have, the Horizon actually has life jackets inside of
the room. Now there's some of them that are out
there where you have to go to. They have these
stations that set up and so what they'll tell you
when you get on these things in the event that
there's some kind of emergency, this area is going to
(13:28):
go to this station and you will be given a
life preserver at this time in the room. Though on
the horizon, this thing comes equipped with life preservers. So
if you're trying to conceal something or somebody, what are
you going to do? Well, first off, you can wrap
them in a blanket. And here's the thing I wonder,
(13:52):
I really wonder, brother, if this was an inboard room
or if this is a room with a balcony. Oh wow,
because it seemed it would seem to me that if
you're going to try to divest yourself of human remain,
and you can do it in a stealthy manner. Dude,
all you got to do if you're in a balcony room,
(14:15):
you merely walk to the balcony and you toss the
body over. But in this case, someone decided to hold on.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
To her.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Brother, Dave. You know, there's there are very confusing facts. Well,
let's don't say facts. Let's just say what's a good
word that we could use here. Opinions? Maybe I don't
know if there are opinions.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
I thought about Joe and I went back. I found
some very quickly reports on how we got this information. Okay,
because here's what we reported. Early Anna drives three hours
from her home in Titusville to Miami Sunday morning to
catch the Carnival Horizon for her Caribbean cruise. The ship
leaves support that afternoon, and guests spend a day on
(15:17):
the open ocean before arriving in Jamaica. It's smooth sailing
from Ocho Rios to the Grand Game in zan Cosmeo.
The Horizon is on its way back to Miami when
tragedy strikes. The reason we all thought she was on
this trip by herself is because that's what we were
led to believe. Joe she drove if she was their
whole family women saying she drove from her home too.
(15:39):
She had been on a trip earlier. Her grandparents had
given her a cruise as a present, and she enjoyed
it so much that she wanted to go on another.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
So here we go.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Early Saturday, the last day of the Horizons voyage, a
passenger is found dead. The cruise ship returns to port early,
asking passengers to disembark from their rooms as quickly as possible.
The FBI, now investigating the death. Carnival says it's up
to the FBI to release further details of their investigation,
and their focus is on supporting the family of the guests.
(16:11):
Eighteen year old and a keptner. Now that's a whole
lot different than what we know.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Now, yeah, yeah, it truly is. And for me, this
is thing about it. Do you remember, God, how long
has it been now? Was it a month ago or
a little over a month ago? We covered burning Man?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Oh yeah, yeah, oh wow?
Speaker 1 (16:37):
And remember the nightmare with that. And by the way,
for those that are interested, they still have solved that,
which I didn't think that they would. And how many
people do we have there? It's like seventy thousand. What
meant the number? And they said that was a low
number because things kind of shuffling down, I think popularity,
but still seventy thousand, seventy thousand. And one of the
things that we came up with with that is that
(17:00):
you literally have people from all over the world that
were present for Burning Men and due they're in the
wind at the end of this thing. The same thing
with a cruise ship now, I mean, if you've got
souls on board, you're going to have because of these
cruise lines, you know, they want to send everybody out
flyers and coupons and everything to bring them back. Obviously,
(17:22):
so you're going to have a manifest of the people
that are on there. You can track them down. It's
not like burning men necessarily. However, if you don't go
right to the source at that moment from the investigative
perspective and try to glean information on it's fresh on
people's minds, or if there's somebody involved in her death.
I'm not saying anybody is. I'm just saying if, okay, well,
(17:44):
now they've had an opportunity to divest themselves of anything
that might have evidentiary value because they're in the wind
and you've got the ship. You've got ships people saying okay,
everybody off. I wonder at the when they disembarked, here's
something right here. I wonder if when they disembark Dave,
if they had spaces to catch these people in as
(18:09):
they're leaving and they're waiting on their luggage and they're
holding them back saying okay, we need to speak to
you in general terms, how do you even manpower wise?
How do you even manage that? So you've got five
thousand people X filling from this boat they're coming down
the gang planks, if you will. I've always wanted to
use that word, not being a Navy person. They're coming
(18:29):
down the gang planks, and you've got one, You've got
a couple of stations they're going to have to funnel
through in order to collect their gear. Did they have
anybody on the outside that could sit there? Some investigators,
maybe locals. I have no idea that could say, Okay,
we've got to get statements, and how do you go
about getting statements from five thousand people? Now to mention,
(18:50):
we're not even talking about the crew, because the crew's
got to be massive as well. They included in.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
This everybody everybody.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Would you know, It's kind of like, you know, murder
on the Orient Express. Now everybody's a suspect essentially, until
you can begin to whittle this thing down.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Well, the reports blamed that Anna's body was discovered under
the bed around eleven am. The Miami Dade Medical Examiner's
Office list her death at her time of death as
eleven seventeen am. Now that oftentimes what we have discovered
or I have discovered in reporting these things, they use
(19:27):
the time that they can say, well, this is the
time we found the dead body. Until that they were
a missing person. So we're gonna put this time down
now and then we'll you know, because that's all I
could figure out, Joe.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Why would they say, oh, I think.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
Well, here's the thing about it. You have Tom of
death and you have Tom pronouncement. Okay, So if they're
if they find her, if they this is the key,
This is what we need to know. When did they
actually put in and when did they actually find her?
(20:00):
Did they find her simultaneously with putting in? When did
the thing actually doc?
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Okay, okay?
Speaker 1 (20:07):
And so was it at that point in time that
somebody walked in and said you're officially dead, you know?
Or because you know the ship these.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Ships have a physician on board, right, Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:22):
You know I got to do is watch Lobo, right
so you know, yeah, Doc, you go there and the
doctor is going to you know, pull up stuff scope
and declared death at that moment time. Now that would
have been if it was out in international waters. I
can't imagine. I mean, I've worked cases in New Orleans
that came into port where I had you know, bodies
on board ships. There were homicides I worked that occurred
(20:44):
on ships. You know, the corner would take over. And
back then it wasn't the FBI that was doing. Lots
of times I would work with a coast guard that
was that was involved in the investigation as opposed to
the FBI. So now you got the FBI involved in it.
FBI cannot pronounce death. It's going to have to be
my dade. But that's a very specific time, Dave. That
time does not sound like like okay, you know, you
(21:07):
and I have talked about postmortem interval, right, and even
I have stated that we cannot narrow down time. What
was the time again?
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Was at eleven seven seventeen? Yeah, dude, that.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Sounds exactly like a time of pronouncement. You know, just
think about I don't know, think about any kind of
medical procedural thing you've ever watched on television. You know,
ER's the first thing comes to mind. I think that
might have been the last time I ever watched serious TV.
But you know they would say, Okay, I'm going to
call it at such and such. Well, eleven seventeen is
very very specific. So that's like a time of pronouncement.
(21:43):
That's not important to me as a forensic scientist. I'm
not interested in your time of pronouncement. I'm interested in
the time of death. And how are you going to
narrow that down? The problem is is that when And
I'm not insult please don't get me wrong. I Am
not hammering away at the people that handle security on
these boats. But they are not Investigator's brother. That's not
(22:07):
what they do. Okay. They're there to keep the peace,
all right. You don't want fights breaking out on the
carnival cruise line, all right. So you've got people, most
of these people are employed from other countries. They maybe
some of them do the line share them I cannot
Maybe they understand something about seeing security, you know, where
we'll lock things down and not give anybody else access
(22:29):
to it and all this stuff. I'm kind of sitting
here vomiting all this on you. But it's running through
my mind right now. Is I'm trying to think, you know,
what would I want to do if I were trying
to work this case myself and it was so dynamic
because you've got this little herd of people that are
exiting exiting a death scene, and I think folks would say, well,
(22:53):
the death scene is actually her cabin. Maybe I beg
to differ. We don't know where she died on this
her body knows that she was hidden, and that sounds
like being hidden. That doesn't sound like I'm going to
go into the bed, put a blanket over me and
cover myself with a life jacket and die.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
I feel still horrible. My stomach cramps are killing me.
I'm going to lay under here. I'm going to get
under the bed.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Now.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
You know what, Joe Celestree of us, we've covered this story,
you and I have done it on several shows. And
yet her body was discovered on September the eighth, Yeah,
inside the tesla. But and technically her birthday was September seventh,
so she was four. She turned fifteen years old, right,
(23:35):
so she's reported as a fifteen year old girl. Dad,
But we know for a fact that she was already
decomposed greatly by the time her body was found. So
even now there are still reporters that say of the
fifteen year old because the day that they discovered her
body was September the eighth, they don't know when she died.
They're trying to figure that out, correct. So I'm wondering
(23:56):
if it's something similar with this.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
I think that the possible ability exists. And so when
when the Evidence Response Teams from the FBI shows up, Okay,
which I would assume because I saw, I saw images
and they wear they actually wear If any if any
of our friends out there are listening right now, and
you ever see, like if you look at the back
(24:19):
of the shirts that they wear in their jackets, we
used to call them ray jackets, the thin thin shell jackets,
it will say FBI and then below it will say
e r T. That actually means Evidence Response Team. And
these people are specifically trained to work crime scenes, all right,
And so any major field office like Miami Miami Dade
(24:41):
is a massive field office. They have an in dwelling lab,
you know, full staff of FBI agents, and the e
RT people are agents as well, but they're just specialized
in forensics. I could have sworn Dave that instill images
that I saw from where this thing is moored at.
You saw these people get onto the boat and they
were wearing those those shirts. So they dispatched a bunch
(25:04):
of people to the scene. I wondering what kind of
information they had. And this is we're getting kind of
in it's not really in the weeds. We're really we're
in our sweet spot. And from what this podcast is
about forensics, I wonder what information they'd been briefed on
before they arrived that they were going to bring out
this level of manpower. They responded like this to a
(25:27):
ship that's got a dead eighteen year old that's been
found wrapped in a blanket and covered covered in life jackets.
So they come up with some kind of pre knowledge.
It wasn't like a you know, a couple of boys
show up with their with their notepads and they're you know,
wearing the standard FBI you know, coat and tie kind.
That's not what you got going on here. You've got
(25:48):
guys showing up dressed to come out and process crime
seeing at this point in time, so they have data
when they're going in. I just want to know who
did the initial assessment of this at the scene to
say they're radio going ahead or calling ahead or whatever
they do on big ships, saying this is what we're
faced with, this is what we need.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
Okay, no interesting to point out most people are not aware.
But in this case, Carnival Cruise, the Carnival Cruise ship
Horizon is actually flagged out of Panama, meaning that's the
nation that covers this boat. It voats in international waters,
and it visits ports of call all over the place.
(26:28):
But when you get right down to it, Joseph Scott Morgan,
Panamanian law on the boat outside in her international waters
is the call. And you mentioned how stacked they were
ready with the FBI, so they had to have been
told a lot. Now, eyewitness reports after the body is found,
the room was staked out and nobody in and out
(26:51):
the hallway locked off from the moment the body was found,
nobody up or down this hallway except getting your crap
and getting out. They blocked it off and kept it
blocked off. This is from eyewitness reports of travelers that
were on the scene. So it was secured as a
crime scene where her body was found, at least from
(27:11):
an eyewitness. Now my question for you, how is it possible,
Joseph Scott Morgan, that we start off by thinking this
eighteen year old girl got a trip and was there
by herself or with a friend, and we have the family,
(27:32):
you know, the cruise ship saying well, we have to
inform the family before we can release the name. And
we know the family is right there she's on the
trip with them. Okay, I want to back up and
tell you that the whole family was on the cruise
ship with her, well, not the whole all the children,
But she's on a cruise with her father and stepmother.
(27:52):
He's recently remarried, and so her father and stepmother and
other family members are on the trip. Two of the
stepmom's children are on this One of them is sixteen
years old. We have a lot of different stories being told,
and it's frustrating to me because as I'm looking at
all of this, and I'm thinking, why are we hearing
(28:13):
from Anna's family that we don't know any more than
you do, and his father and stepmother don't know anything
more than we know.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
What the heck, she's dead.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Under her bed, and we aren't even getting the truth
for the first week, meaning the news report, we don't.
They're not even saying, well, we were on the trip.
They're not doing anything like that.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Joe.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
It's like there's a cover up by the family going on.
And I'm not accusing them of wrongdoing. I'm saying it
seems like something is really not quite right. Oftentimes news
stories get misreported. Bad reporting happens all the time, but
you catch it and you correct it, and you know,
you move forward on. I went back and looked at
(29:01):
the original reporting, wanted to make sure, and we've got
the families saying, well, we don't know any more than
you do. Well, now we know where her body was,
and what do we know about the condition of her body?
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Joe, Yeah, well not a lot at this point. I
think most of it is speculative at the very best.
And you know, the big reveal is going to come
from Miami Dade medical examiner, not law enforcement. Remember Miami Dade.
(29:35):
Miami Dade. The reason it's called that is that the
city and the county are both consolidated. You don't have
separate police force down there. Okay, you've got you know,
Miami Dade Police, all right, Same thing happened in Nashville,
all right. Like Metro I think it's called Metro Davison
now or whatever it is. It's named after the county
that's the national PD. Well, the me down there, and
(29:59):
most of Florida is broken down. I think all of Florida,
with the exception of Miami. I might be wrong. Somebody
correct me on that. I'm sure you will. But just
like Florida's broken down into Emmy regions, not Miami. Miami
is so robust with a number of cases they have
that it's a singular, standalone agency, So they will have
(30:20):
taken over this investigation. From the medical legal perspective, the
trick is is who's going to be tasked with releasing information?
Because if the FEDS are involved in it, If the
FEDS are involved in this scene, which obviously they are,
are they going to be the conduit for any further
releases as far as specifics about the case now, sooner
(30:43):
or later. If they're zeroing in if there is something
to be revealed that comes about from this autopsy, you
have to believe that whoever that is is not going
to have to appear before judge in Miami day, Brother Dave,
(31:04):
They're going to have to appear before a federal magistrate.
It's not why, it's not how, it's not even really when.
(31:28):
It's what, what exactly happened to this child? What happened
to her?
Speaker 4 (31:37):
You know?
Speaker 1 (31:38):
And as I mentioned, Dave, the the answers will rest
in the science. You and I we always look to
the science, don't we? On body backs. The science is
going to it's going to be our true north, right,
that compass that points us to the truth if we
stay with the science, we follow the science, what's real,
what's false, what can be hat away? And just know
(32:01):
that that's nothing but bs. Most of the time, science
is going to point the way in any kind of
case like this. And David, it's my opinion that in
this case, forensics is going to rule the day because
there's going to be obvious signs here. It's either gonna
lie within toxicology findings or was there something going on
(32:26):
that's visible, like what was there? Were there injuries to her?
Because right now, definitively through from the authorities, you know,
the people that really really count, right, they ain't saying
peep at this point.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
Dude, well let me ask you about this show, because
let's just play what we know?
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Yeah, or no, what we think we know? How about that? Okay, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
We've been told that Anna at dinner said she didn't
feel well. How there's stomach thing going on? Now she's
eighteen years old on a cruise. She's not She's going
to be more than just an upset Tommy, you know,
to make her leave dinner and go back to her
room while you're out on a cruise of a lifetime.
So she did that, according to family, You know, she
(33:08):
left dinner and went to her room to lay down
because she didn't feel well. She doesn't get up in
the morning and go to breakfast, so that they thought, well,
maybe she's not still not feeling well, let's go check
on her, and that's when they find she's not in
her room.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
So is it possible or no? Is it likely?
Speaker 3 (33:27):
We've heard of plenty of people being slip something, especially
young women being slipped something in a drink that causes
them to not feel well and within a matter of
minutes be kind of out of swords. And is it
possible somebody did something to her drink or food that
(33:49):
when she left, they followed her back to the room
and then something happened.
Speaker 2 (33:53):
Is that a possibility?
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Yeah? I think I guess it could be. I mean,
if we're talking about on a resort. Okay, the first
name that comes to mind is Natalie Halloway because that's
comebag that's now in prison. Where's Peru? Is that where
he's at? You know? I know that we went and
did the on site in Birmingham when he was you
know he was brought in. That was an interesting day.
(34:16):
You know, we got to be there in front of
the cameras for that. That was pretty wild. When he
was brought back to America, Vanderschaum that was his name. Yeah,
and he had admitted you know, I think it was
something like g HB. He was passing out to people.
And interesting aside, when I was over in Great Britain
there were these people at crime Con UK that were
(34:39):
and probably other people have these. I thought it was
pretty cool invention. They've got these covers for your cocktail
glasses that you can insert a straw through the cover
and it's it's kind of rubberized, so someone cannot just
arbitrarily walk up and drop something into your drink.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
I thought it was kind of cool, you know, because
it's a devilish world.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
Out there is think about how how sick things are
that you actually have to come up.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
With something to do that, and we.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
Would say that's a good idea, but all that, but
now you know, we've actually I've had a friend that
was at a resort with his wife who looked like
she was a in a bikini. She looked very young,
and she goes to get a drink. She comes back
and says, takes a sip. I don't feel good right,
And anyway, my buddy also takes a sip, he starts
(35:26):
not feeling good. Within a matter of minutes, they both good.
They got mickeyed right, And so what are we thinking
with this? She leaves dinner not feeling well, goes back
to her room. Where do you start investigating that?
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Well? Yeah, I mean, obviously I'm gonna be real blunt
with you, brother, She's not been deceased for a long time.
So at autopsy, when they're doing the examination, they're going
to do blood, draw urine, draw bile, and vitreous, all
four of them. That you're some uh, bile from the
(36:01):
gall bladder. We're gonna get heart blood probably directly from
the awarder or the atrum, and we're gonna draw urine
directly from the bladder. Okay, And they're going to put
on a full, full on panel with this. I would
imagine as well, knowing that I don't know how to
(36:21):
say this, knowing that she's coming off of a cruise ship,
I would imagine that they would be looking They might
even do a more sensitive test looking for any kind
of exotics that may have been, you know, in her system,
because you know, there are certain things that you don't
normally look for. Do you remember I lose track of time.
(36:43):
Remember we were covering those cases. There was the couple
out of Turkey, and then we had the ones that
were over in Indonesia where the couple remember the one
one couple that was given they bought a bottle of
lemon drop.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Do you remember that now?
Speaker 1 (36:58):
And it wasn't ethanol, it was methanol. Man, and the
girl called her mama in England and said, I can't
see remember how horrible that was. And the boyfriend or
the Yeah, the boyfriend was found dead already and she
was just hanging on. She eventually died. There's been several
of those. But that's methanol. That's not like something you
(37:19):
would put into a drink. That means that they're manufacturing
an alcoholic beverage with methanol's posed to ethanol, and methanol
is not compatible with life all right. So the reason
I'm bringing that up is there all this stuff has
to be considered, okay, So when they're doing the talks
panel on her, they're going to look for any kind
of weird manifestation in the results. She has not This
(37:44):
has not happened long enough ago for that panel to
have come back yet. I can almost dollars to donuts.
I can almost guarantee that and the standard line. I'll
go ahead and state right here, we're probably looking at
six weeks unless they're trying to get to sing expedite
or here's another thing that might happen, todave. I didn't
think about this. The FBI may have got no samples.
(38:07):
They may have gotten no samples and sent them to
Quantico Okay for an expedited, expedited testing on her. Because
this is something that occurred in international waters, Isn't that's
something to think about, I know, because you know that
it might not be completely relying upon Miami Dade. You know,
Miami Dade has their own cases, dude. You know they
got a pretty robust case case a log that comes
(38:29):
from Miami Dade.
Speaker 3 (38:30):
And think about, Joe, if this happened in international waters,
Miami Dade, who has control over this. I mean, they
came to port here, but that's not where it happened. Maybe,
I mean what I'm guessing. I'm not a lawyer, don't
even pretend to be one. But I have to wonder
who's really in charge. The FBI has grabbed this and
they are doing it like they're in charge, but I wonder,
(38:51):
you know, but.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Hey, let's just know. Yeah, And that's the thing about it,
the timing here, And I don't know. I don't know
enough about what's referred to as admiral law. And I
think that there is a portion obviously of admiralty law
that goes to criminality, you know, on the high seeds.
You know, who's going to have jurisdiction over that. My
suspicion is because having work cases that put in into
(39:14):
New Orleans, if there was a homicide that was perpetrated
on a boat, it was going to be up to
the locals to handle that. In the past, maybe they're
deferring to the FEDS. I might be talking at school,
but that's my thought here. You look at this and
you think, and again, I ain't an attorney, have no desire.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
To anyone by the way.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
The you know, I'm thinking, are there any kind of
international laws that would apply here relative to if you're
going to prosecute a homicide? And who's going to wind
up prosecuting I think that if the FBI is tasked
we're working this case, they're going to be the ones
that if there is some if there is an arrest
affected in this case, they're going to be one putting
(39:57):
the bracelests on whoever it is. We've got this beautif
full eighteen year old young woman who has died on
board a literal floating city, surrounded by perhaps five thousand people,
with her family, and right now your guess is just
(40:21):
as good as mine. We have no answers, but I
guarantee you this, When we get those answers, Brother Dave
and I are going to come right back at you
and we're going to fill you in and hopefully fill
in all the blanks. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan, and this
is body Bags
Body dots, but Joseph's gotten more. I'm claustrophobic. I'll fully
admit that, I truly am. You know, that's one of
the reasons I had no desire. I had a couple
of buddies that joined the Navy. I had one body
that actually was a sub mariner, a nuclear guy, and
(00:23):
very bright right off those scales, and he now works
in the nuclear engineering industry. But you know that there's
something about being in the Navy, certainly being on a
sub where you're so confined. That's why I like the
Army so much. I'm not saying I'm the bravest guy,
but I always knew that I had someplace to escape
(00:45):
to on land. I ain't nowhere to run on a ship,
And to be honest, it's not something that really ever
attracts me. But there are thousands and thousands of people
year that bored cruise ships out of various ports, and
certainly those ports have become more buried now. Even in
(01:07):
my own hometown of New Orleans, there are several cruise
lines that leave out of the dock that's immediately adjacent
to the French Quarter. But you know, predominantly we're talking Florida, right,
And people go for a variety of reasons. But I
think that what people really want to do is escape,
to get out there, leave their cares behind, engorge themselves
(01:33):
on lovely food, perhaps have drink, sit by the pool,
and just be left alone. Maybe I've just stated my
ideal vacation. I'm not sure, but there is one family
right now that has questions. There's one family out there
that wants to understand how in the world did their
(01:55):
baby girl wind up at eighteen deceased on a cruise ship,
perhaps wrapped in a blanket and found by a maid
beneath a bed. Coming to you from the beautiful campus
of Jacksonville State University. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this
(02:20):
is Body Bags Day for anybody that follows me on
my social media. A lot of and you know this,
a lot of my photos. I love Instagram. I just
love it. I guess it's part of it's the warrior
in me. But I love taking pictures. Right. Most of
(02:44):
my images on my Instagram are me and Kimmy Sue
out on my pontoon boat cruising up and down the
Coosa River in northeast Alabama. It's beautiful right now, by
the way, you need to come join in some time.
That the leaves right now are just absolutely gorge and
there's you know, kind of mountainous terrain. It's high hills essentially.
(03:04):
It's not like the Rockies or anything. But the trees
are just screaming right now, so gorgeous, and you're there alone.
You're not going to run into like another car driving
up a mountain, you know, with the leafers like they
talk about up in New England. It's just gorgeous and
it's peaceful. But that's really the only cruising. I gotta
tell you something here I've never revealed to you before.
(03:25):
I have never been on a cruise. I've never been
on a cruise. Been on a lot of boats and
gone fishing a lot, but I have never been on
an ocean going vessel to cruise. I've been out in
blue water on a fishing boat, but never to cruise.
There's just something about it that's very, very confining to me.
I've just I don't know if I can, if I
(03:47):
could go and relax, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I have been.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
I've been tempted with trips, okay, doing it when you
do radio.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yeah, as long as I did.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
There's all kinds of promotions and there's always opportunities to
do things like that, to go on a cruise, and
it's all paid for me, which is awesome. I've never
wanted to do it. And my reason is real simple.
If I'm out on a boat and I don't feel well,
I want to go home. I want any I can't.
I'm not in charge. I'm stuck with everybody else. And
(04:20):
on top of that, there are some people that are crazy,
and even if you're on a boat with four thousand
other people, number three thirty nine ninety nine is going
to find me, and that crazy one is not going
to leave me alone. So you know, I'm perfectly fine
with never ever going on a cruise ship and just again.
So that's why whenever there's a story about a cruise ship,
(04:43):
I don't sit there and go see. That's why I
don't do it. I don't do my own personal psychotic reasons,
you know. I mean, I guess I'm a control free.
Everything about a cruise sounds fun to me. It sounds
like it would be a great vacation. It's an affordable
thing to whatever you want if you like to party,
you can party you like to you know, whatever you
want to do, you can do a board a cruise ship. Now, granted,
(05:03):
everything you do on a cruise ship you can do
on land without having to worry about somebody right next
door to you having a you know, a fiesta while
you're trying to have a siesta. At any rate, in
this particular case, we have a young girl, and well,
first of all, we got a convoluted story.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
Joe, Yes, this story has changed.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
When we first got this, it was an eighteen year
old high school senior cheerleader who is planning to join
the arm of the Navy is on this cruise. There's
no mention of family, there's no mention of anything, and
we were looking at it because she all of a
(05:42):
sudden she dies on this boat alone. Right, that's the
original story and it's not anything like that. And we're
finding out things days into this. You're going, wait a minute,
the family was with her. We've already done this story
twice and we just now know the family was with it.
They're just admitis so, yeah, this story is bad. There's
(06:03):
something really really not good. And I don't mean that
in a mean way. I mean it in the way
that we're looking at a story. You've got an eighteen
year old girl who's dead, who went on a cruise.
She's a cheerleader in high school. This is the time
of her life. You're kicking off adulthood, you're getting ready,
and you die. And now we find out that her body.
(06:27):
Well we started off with she's missing. You know, you
go missing on a cruise ship. That's happened before. We've
had plenty of people. I mean, Amy Bradley comes to
mind because Netflix has a story on her right now.
I encourage you to watch that too. By the way,
Amy Bradley very well could have been in a house
of ill repute located right next door to Carlos and
(06:48):
Charlie's on her root. But when Natalie Holloway was there, Wow,
you know that's all part of that story too. And
Amy Bradley was on a cruise with her family and
she just in this case, we actually have an eighteen
year old who disappeared briefly, but they found her. And
(07:10):
I want to back up into this, Joe, because she
actually said she wasn't feeling well when they were at dinner, right.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, she did, And backing up even further this cruise.
Now they're from Titusville. Oh yeah, Titusville, Florida, which, by
the way, on the little side, one of my favorite
restaurants anywhere in Florida is actually in Titusville. It's a
place called Dixie Crossroads and they serve rock shrimp. It's
this amazing experience. You ever get a chance to go
(07:38):
down there and eat rock shrimp. It's really I hope
it's still in business. I might be endorsing something that
no longer exists, but yeah, the restaurant was really good.
That's what I know Titusville for and been there several
times over the years going to the east coast of Florida.
But thinking about this, the family is from Titusville, and
that's what two is like three hours by car from
(07:59):
ti us fell down to the Miami area, which is
actually where this cruise departed from. And I think they
left out of their day if I'm not mistaken, on
November the second, if memory serves me, so, on November second,
they've already been at sea now for four four days.
(08:21):
I don't know how many sleeps that would before sleeps maybe.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
Well, you got to figure the carnival Horizon leaves Miami
on November second. On November sixth, they dock in Cosamel
and Anna leaves dinner feeling unwell. Now some of this
is even changing, Joe, some of the dates that we're hearing,
But let's just stick with this plan for right now,
(08:46):
because we've got it etched in stone for the moment.
The next morning, Anna does not join the family for breakfast.
Remember at dinner, I don't feel good. The next morning,
she doesn't show up for breakfast, and that they're like, well,
we need to go check on her. Now, at eighteen
year old enough to be in a room by yourself,
(09:07):
I guess she was there by herself. I don't know
if she was rooming with any of their family members
that were on the trip.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
Have you heard about that yet or no?
Speaker 1 (09:16):
I haven't. And that's what's so convoluted. And going back
to what you said earlier, Dave, I don't know if
you recall this. We were on another show together, and
on that show we had mentioned or it had been
mentioned that the grandparents were involved. Remember that was an
earlier iteration of this where they said that the grandparents
were taking her on this trip, right, this trip of
(09:39):
a lifetime. It was like a celebratory event for her
upcoming you know, graduation. She goes to a Christian school,
so it's private school, I guess, you know, And I
got scratched my head. Ohere, this thing seems like a
weird time of year to go on a cruise. And
you know, how do you get out of school to
do this. She's a senior. Maybe she's finished up all
of her core core work that she has to do,
(10:00):
and she's also to graduate. But what I'm saying is,
like you said, it's almost like a play where you
don't have a cast list and the players keep changing
with every new article that comes out of a newspaper somewhere.
So and not everybody's been forthcoming about this, and I'll
go ahead. The big reveal here is the fact that
the FEDS are involved in this because this happened in
(10:24):
international waters and so it's not like you're locked into
like a local constabulary where you might get more information.
As you well know, and I know I'm preaching the
choir to you, brother, the FBI is notoriously they're like Stonehenge,
you know, they just kind of sit there, you know,
and you're not going to get anything out of them, period,
(10:46):
and that can be rather frustrated, I know for people
you know that are interested in the news of this
case and whatnot. But that's kind of where we are.
So now people are left and the media's and looking
at you media. The media is out there trying to
piece this thing together and create their own narrative. What
(11:06):
we do know, though, is that she was in fact
in this room, and David, if I'm not mistaken, I
believe that she was not found by family. She was
found allegedly by maid.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
I'm assuming right, And I did want to address that
because you have the family we mentioned she didn't feel
well at dinner, and she retired from dinner and went
to her room and then did not come to breakfast
in the morning. They go to the room and look
and don't see anything, And so we're scouring the ship.
(11:40):
Now it's a big ship. There's four thousand people on
this ship. If I'm not mistaken, roughly give or take.
I mean, it's a small city.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Think about that. And when they start.
Speaker 3 (11:52):
Looking for her, you're going to tear apart the room,
but not to the point of lifting anything up. You look,
because you're not assuming anything sinister. She just got maybe
she's met a boy and they're talking, and you know,
you're thinking innocent thoughts at that point. But it was
a maid that comes by to clean the room, I guess,
(12:15):
And that's when looking under the mattresses and other things.
Her body was found under the mattress under life preservers covered,
so she wasn't easy to see even if you lifted
the mattress up. But I got a feeling adding one
(12:37):
hundred plus pound body to an area that's not supposed
to have it is going to make it look different
on the outside.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Oh, of course it would. And you know, I checked out.
I went on and checked out the some of these
This is Carnival Cruise Lines, by the way, And as
you mentioned, the ship's name is the Horizon, and I
went and kind of did a little research about them.
Unlike some of these other ships within the fleet that
(13:06):
they have, the Horizon actually has life jackets inside of
the room. Now there's some of them that are out
there where you have to go to. They have these
stations that set up and so what they'll tell you
when you get on these things in the event that
there's some kind of emergency, this area is going to
(13:28):
go to this station and you will be given a
life preserver at this time in the room. Though on
the horizon, this thing comes equipped with life preservers. So
if you're trying to conceal something or somebody, what are
you going to do? Well, first off, you can wrap
them in a blanket. And here's the thing I wonder,
(13:52):
I really wonder, brother, if this was an inboard room
or if this is a room with a balcony. Oh wow,
because it seemed it would seem to me that if
you're going to try to divest yourself of human remain,
and you can do it in a stealthy manner. Dude,
all you got to do if you're in a balcony room,
(14:15):
you merely walk to the balcony and you toss the
body over. But in this case, someone decided to hold on.
Speaker 4 (14:26):
To her.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Brother, Dave. You know, there's there are very confusing facts. Well,
let's don't say facts. Let's just say what's a good
word that we could use here. Opinions? Maybe I don't
know if there are opinions.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
I thought about Joe and I went back. I found
some very quickly reports on how we got this information. Okay,
because here's what we reported. Early Anna drives three hours
from her home in Titusville to Miami Sunday morning to
catch the Carnival Horizon for her Caribbean cruise. The ship
leaves support that afternoon, and guests spend a day on
(15:17):
the open ocean before arriving in Jamaica. It's smooth sailing
from Ocho Rios to the Grand Game in zan Cosmeo.
The Horizon is on its way back to Miami when
tragedy strikes. The reason we all thought she was on
this trip by herself is because that's what we were
led to believe. Joe she drove if she was their
whole family women saying she drove from her home too.
(15:39):
She had been on a trip earlier. Her grandparents had
given her a cruise as a present, and she enjoyed
it so much that she wanted to go on another.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
So here we go.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Early Saturday, the last day of the Horizons voyage, a
passenger is found dead. The cruise ship returns to port early,
asking passengers to disembark from their rooms as quickly as possible.
The FBI, now investigating the death. Carnival says it's up
to the FBI to release further details of their investigation,
and their focus is on supporting the family of the guests.
(16:11):
Eighteen year old and a keptner. Now that's a whole
lot different than what we know.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Now, yeah, yeah, it truly is. And for me, this
is thing about it. Do you remember, God, how long
has it been now? Was it a month ago or
a little over a month ago? We covered burning Man?
Speaker 2 (16:36):
Oh yeah, yeah, oh wow?
Speaker 1 (16:37):
And remember the nightmare with that. And by the way,
for those that are interested, they still have solved that,
which I didn't think that they would. And how many
people do we have there? It's like seventy thousand. What
meant the number? And they said that was a low
number because things kind of shuffling down, I think popularity,
but still seventy thousand, seventy thousand. And one of the
things that we came up with with that is that
(17:00):
you literally have people from all over the world that
were present for Burning Men and due they're in the
wind at the end of this thing. The same thing
with a cruise ship now, I mean, if you've got
souls on board, you're going to have because of these
cruise lines, you know, they want to send everybody out
flyers and coupons and everything to bring them back. Obviously,
(17:22):
so you're going to have a manifest of the people
that are on there. You can track them down. It's
not like burning men necessarily. However, if you don't go
right to the source at that moment from the investigative
perspective and try to glean information on it's fresh on
people's minds, or if there's somebody involved in her death.
I'm not saying anybody is. I'm just saying if, okay, well,
(17:44):
now they've had an opportunity to divest themselves of anything
that might have evidentiary value because they're in the wind
and you've got the ship. You've got ships people saying okay,
everybody off. I wonder at the when they disembarked, here's
something right here. I wonder if when they disembark Dave,
if they had spaces to catch these people in as
(18:09):
they're leaving and they're waiting on their luggage and they're
holding them back saying okay, we need to speak to
you in general terms, how do you even manpower wise?
How do you even manage that? So you've got five
thousand people X filling from this boat they're coming down
the gang planks, if you will. I've always wanted to
use that word, not being a Navy person. They're coming
(18:29):
down the gang planks, and you've got one, You've got
a couple of stations they're going to have to funnel
through in order to collect their gear. Did they have
anybody on the outside that could sit there? Some investigators,
maybe locals. I have no idea that could say, Okay,
we've got to get statements, and how do you go
about getting statements from five thousand people? Now to mention,
(18:50):
we're not even talking about the crew, because the crew's
got to be massive as well. They included in.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
This everybody everybody.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Would you know, It's kind of like, you know, murder
on the Orient Express. Now everybody's a suspect essentially, until
you can begin to whittle this thing down.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Well, the reports blamed that Anna's body was discovered under
the bed around eleven am. The Miami Dade Medical Examiner's
Office list her death at her time of death as
eleven seventeen am. Now that oftentimes what we have discovered
or I have discovered in reporting these things, they use
(19:27):
the time that they can say, well, this is the
time we found the dead body. Until that they were
a missing person. So we're gonna put this time down
now and then we'll you know, because that's all I
could figure out, Joe.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Why would they say, oh, I think.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
Well, here's the thing about it. You have Tom of
death and you have Tom pronouncement. Okay, So if they're
if they find her, if they this is the key,
This is what we need to know. When did they
actually put in and when did they actually find her?
(20:00):
Did they find her simultaneously with putting in? When did
the thing actually doc?
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Okay, okay?
Speaker 1 (20:07):
And so was it at that point in time that
somebody walked in and said you're officially dead, you know?
Or because you know the ship these.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Ships have a physician on board, right, Yeah?
Speaker 1 (20:22):
You know I got to do is watch Lobo, right
so you know, yeah, Doc, you go there and the
doctor is going to you know, pull up stuff scope
and declared death at that moment time. Now that would
have been if it was out in international waters. I
can't imagine. I mean, I've worked cases in New Orleans
that came into port where I had you know, bodies
on board ships. There were homicides I worked that occurred
(20:44):
on ships. You know, the corner would take over. And
back then it wasn't the FBI that was doing. Lots
of times I would work with a coast guard that
was that was involved in the investigation as opposed to
the FBI. So now you got the FBI involved in it.
FBI cannot pronounce death. It's going to have to be
my dade. But that's a very specific time, Dave. That
time does not sound like like okay, you know, you
(21:07):
and I have talked about postmortem interval, right, and even
I have stated that we cannot narrow down time. What
was the time again?
Speaker 2 (21:16):
Was at eleven seven seventeen? Yeah, dude, that.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Sounds exactly like a time of pronouncement. You know, just
think about I don't know, think about any kind of
medical procedural thing you've ever watched on television. You know,
ER's the first thing comes to mind. I think that
might have been the last time I ever watched serious TV.
But you know they would say, Okay, I'm going to
call it at such and such. Well, eleven seventeen is
very very specific. So that's like a time of pronouncement.
(21:43):
That's not important to me as a forensic scientist. I'm
not interested in your time of pronouncement. I'm interested in
the time of death. And how are you going to
narrow that down? The problem is is that when And
I'm not insult please don't get me wrong. I Am
not hammering away at the people that handle security on
these boats. But they are not Investigator's brother. That's not
(22:07):
what they do. Okay. They're there to keep the peace,
all right. You don't want fights breaking out on the
carnival cruise line, all right. So you've got people, most
of these people are employed from other countries. They maybe
some of them do the line share them I cannot
Maybe they understand something about seeing security, you know, where
we'll lock things down and not give anybody else access
(22:29):
to it and all this stuff. I'm kind of sitting
here vomiting all this on you. But it's running through
my mind right now. Is I'm trying to think, you know,
what would I want to do if I were trying
to work this case myself and it was so dynamic
because you've got this little herd of people that are
exiting exiting a death scene, and I think folks would say, well,
(22:53):
the death scene is actually her cabin. Maybe I beg
to differ. We don't know where she died on this
her body knows that she was hidden, and that sounds
like being hidden. That doesn't sound like I'm going to
go into the bed, put a blanket over me and
cover myself with a life jacket and die.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
I feel still horrible. My stomach cramps are killing me.
I'm going to lay under here. I'm going to get
under the bed.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Now.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
You know what, Joe Celestree of us, we've covered this story,
you and I have done it on several shows. And
yet her body was discovered on September the eighth, Yeah,
inside the tesla. But and technically her birthday was September seventh,
so she was four. She turned fifteen years old, right,
(23:35):
so she's reported as a fifteen year old girl. Dad,
But we know for a fact that she was already
decomposed greatly by the time her body was found. So
even now there are still reporters that say of the
fifteen year old because the day that they discovered her
body was September the eighth, they don't know when she died.
They're trying to figure that out, correct. So I'm wondering
(23:56):
if it's something similar with this.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
I think that the possible ability exists. And so when
when the Evidence Response Teams from the FBI shows up, Okay,
which I would assume because I saw, I saw images
and they wear they actually wear If any if any
of our friends out there are listening right now, and
you ever see, like if you look at the back
(24:19):
of the shirts that they wear in their jackets, we
used to call them ray jackets, the thin thin shell jackets,
it will say FBI and then below it will say
e r T. That actually means Evidence Response Team. And
these people are specifically trained to work crime scenes, all right,
And so any major field office like Miami Miami Dade
(24:41):
is a massive field office. They have an in dwelling lab,
you know, full staff of FBI agents, and the e
RT people are agents as well, but they're just specialized
in forensics. I could have sworn Dave that instill images
that I saw from where this thing is moored at.
You saw these people get onto the boat and they
were wearing those those shirts. So they dispatched a bunch
(25:04):
of people to the scene. I wondering what kind of
information they had. And this is we're getting kind of
in it's not really in the weeds. We're really we're
in our sweet spot. And from what this podcast is
about forensics, I wonder what information they'd been briefed on
before they arrived that they were going to bring out
this level of manpower. They responded like this to a
(25:27):
ship that's got a dead eighteen year old that's been
found wrapped in a blanket and covered covered in life jackets.
So they come up with some kind of pre knowledge.
It wasn't like a you know, a couple of boys
show up with their with their notepads and they're you know,
wearing the standard FBI you know, coat and tie kind.
That's not what you got going on here. You've got
(25:48):
guys showing up dressed to come out and process crime
seeing at this point in time, so they have data
when they're going in. I just want to know who
did the initial assessment of this at the scene to
say they're radio going ahead or calling ahead or whatever
they do on big ships, saying this is what we're
faced with, this is what we need.
Speaker 3 (26:06):
Okay, no interesting to point out most people are not aware.
But in this case, Carnival Cruise, the Carnival Cruise ship
Horizon is actually flagged out of Panama, meaning that's the
nation that covers this boat. It voats in international waters,
and it visits ports of call all over the place.
(26:28):
But when you get right down to it, Joseph Scott Morgan,
Panamanian law on the boat outside in her international waters
is the call. And you mentioned how stacked they were
ready with the FBI, so they had to have been
told a lot. Now, eyewitness reports after the body is found,
the room was staked out and nobody in and out
(26:51):
the hallway locked off from the moment the body was found,
nobody up or down this hallway except getting your crap
and getting out. They blocked it off and kept it
blocked off. This is from eyewitness reports of travelers that
were on the scene. So it was secured as a
crime scene where her body was found, at least from
(27:11):
an eyewitness. Now my question for you, how is it possible,
Joseph Scott Morgan, that we start off by thinking this
eighteen year old girl got a trip and was there
by herself or with a friend, and we have the family,
(27:32):
you know, the cruise ship saying well, we have to
inform the family before we can release the name. And
we know the family is right there she's on the
trip with them. Okay, I want to back up and
tell you that the whole family was on the cruise
ship with her, well, not the whole all the children,
But she's on a cruise with her father and stepmother.
(27:52):
He's recently remarried, and so her father and stepmother and
other family members are on the trip. Two of the
stepmom's children are on this One of them is sixteen
years old. We have a lot of different stories being told,
and it's frustrating to me because as I'm looking at
all of this, and I'm thinking, why are we hearing
(28:13):
from Anna's family that we don't know any more than
you do, and his father and stepmother don't know anything
more than we know.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
What the heck, she's dead.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Under her bed, and we aren't even getting the truth
for the first week, meaning the news report, we don't.
They're not even saying, well, we were on the trip.
They're not doing anything like that.
Speaker 2 (28:40):
Joe.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
It's like there's a cover up by the family going on.
And I'm not accusing them of wrongdoing. I'm saying it
seems like something is really not quite right. Oftentimes news
stories get misreported. Bad reporting happens all the time, but
you catch it and you correct it, and you know,
you move forward on. I went back and looked at
(29:01):
the original reporting, wanted to make sure, and we've got
the families saying, well, we don't know any more than
you do. Well, now we know where her body was,
and what do we know about the condition of her body?
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Joe, Yeah, well not a lot at this point. I
think most of it is speculative at the very best.
And you know, the big reveal is going to come
from Miami Dade medical examiner, not law enforcement. Remember Miami Dade.
(29:35):
Miami Dade. The reason it's called that is that the
city and the county are both consolidated. You don't have
separate police force down there. Okay, you've got you know,
Miami Dade Police, all right, Same thing happened in Nashville,
all right. Like Metro I think it's called Metro Davison
now or whatever it is. It's named after the county
that's the national PD. Well, the me down there, and
(29:59):
most of Florida is broken down. I think all of Florida,
with the exception of Miami. I might be wrong. Somebody
correct me on that. I'm sure you will. But just
like Florida's broken down into Emmy regions, not Miami. Miami
is so robust with a number of cases they have
that it's a singular, standalone agency, So they will have
(30:20):
taken over this investigation. From the medical legal perspective, the
trick is is who's going to be tasked with releasing information?
Because if the FEDS are involved in it, If the
FEDS are involved in this scene, which obviously they are,
are they going to be the conduit for any further
releases as far as specifics about the case now, sooner
(30:43):
or later. If they're zeroing in if there is something
to be revealed that comes about from this autopsy, you
have to believe that whoever that is is not going
to have to appear before judge in Miami day, Brother Dave,
(31:04):
They're going to have to appear before a federal magistrate.
It's not why, it's not how, it's not even really when.
(31:28):
It's what, what exactly happened to this child? What happened
to her?
Speaker 4 (31:37):
You know?
Speaker 1 (31:38):
And as I mentioned, Dave, the the answers will rest
in the science. You and I we always look to
the science, don't we? On body backs. The science is
going to it's going to be our true north, right,
that compass that points us to the truth if we
stay with the science, we follow the science, what's real,
what's false, what can be hat away? And just know
(32:01):
that that's nothing but bs. Most of the time, science
is going to point the way in any kind of
case like this. And David, it's my opinion that in
this case, forensics is going to rule the day because
there's going to be obvious signs here. It's either gonna
lie within toxicology findings or was there something going on
(32:26):
that's visible, like what was there? Were there injuries to her?
Because right now, definitively through from the authorities, you know,
the people that really really count, right, they ain't saying
peep at this point.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
Dude, well let me ask you about this show, because
let's just play what we know?
Speaker 2 (32:42):
Yeah, or no, what we think we know? How about that? Okay, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
We've been told that Anna at dinner said she didn't
feel well. How there's stomach thing going on? Now she's
eighteen years old on a cruise. She's not She's going
to be more than just an upset Tommy, you know,
to make her leave dinner and go back to her
room while you're out on a cruise of a lifetime.
So she did that, according to family, You know, she
(33:08):
left dinner and went to her room to lay down
because she didn't feel well. She doesn't get up in
the morning and go to breakfast, so that they thought, well,
maybe she's not still not feeling well, let's go check
on her, and that's when they find she's not in
her room.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
So is it possible or no? Is it likely?
Speaker 3 (33:27):
We've heard of plenty of people being slip something, especially
young women being slipped something in a drink that causes
them to not feel well and within a matter of
minutes be kind of out of swords. And is it
possible somebody did something to her drink or food that
(33:49):
when she left, they followed her back to the room
and then something happened.
Speaker 2 (33:53):
Is that a possibility?
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Yeah? I think I guess it could be. I mean,
if we're talking about on a resort. Okay, the first
name that comes to mind is Natalie Halloway because that's
comebag that's now in prison. Where's Peru? Is that where
he's at? You know? I know that we went and
did the on site in Birmingham when he was you
know he was brought in. That was an interesting day.
(34:16):
You know, we got to be there in front of
the cameras for that. That was pretty wild. When he
was brought back to America, Vanderschaum that was his name. Yeah,
and he had admitted you know, I think it was
something like g HB. He was passing out to people.
And interesting aside, when I was over in Great Britain
there were these people at crime Con UK that were
(34:39):
and probably other people have these. I thought it was
pretty cool invention. They've got these covers for your cocktail
glasses that you can insert a straw through the cover
and it's it's kind of rubberized, so someone cannot just
arbitrarily walk up and drop something into your drink.
Speaker 2 (34:54):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
I thought it was kind of cool, you know, because
it's a devilish world.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
Out there is think about how how sick things are
that you actually have to come up.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
With something to do that, and we.
Speaker 3 (35:03):
Would say that's a good idea, but all that, but
now you know, we've actually I've had a friend that
was at a resort with his wife who looked like
she was a in a bikini. She looked very young,
and she goes to get a drink. She comes back
and says, takes a sip. I don't feel good right,
And anyway, my buddy also takes a sip, he starts
(35:26):
not feeling good. Within a matter of minutes, they both good.
They got mickeyed right, And so what are we thinking
with this? She leaves dinner not feeling well, goes back
to her room. Where do you start investigating that?
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Well? Yeah, I mean, obviously I'm gonna be real blunt
with you, brother, She's not been deceased for a long time.
So at autopsy, when they're doing the examination, they're going
to do blood, draw urine, draw bile, and vitreous, all
four of them. That you're some uh, bile from the
(36:01):
gall bladder. We're gonna get heart blood probably directly from
the awarder or the atrum, and we're gonna draw urine
directly from the bladder. Okay, And they're going to put
on a full, full on panel with this. I would
imagine as well, knowing that I don't know how to
(36:21):
say this, knowing that she's coming off of a cruise ship,
I would imagine that they would be looking They might
even do a more sensitive test looking for any kind
of exotics that may have been, you know, in her system,
because you know, there are certain things that you don't
normally look for. Do you remember I lose track of time.
(36:43):
Remember we were covering those cases. There was the couple
out of Turkey, and then we had the ones that
were over in Indonesia where the couple remember the one
one couple that was given they bought a bottle of
lemon drop.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Do you remember that now?
Speaker 1 (36:58):
And it wasn't ethanol, it was methanol. Man, and the
girl called her mama in England and said, I can't
see remember how horrible that was. And the boyfriend or
the Yeah, the boyfriend was found dead already and she
was just hanging on. She eventually died. There's been several
of those. But that's methanol. That's not like something you
(37:19):
would put into a drink. That means that they're manufacturing
an alcoholic beverage with methanol's posed to ethanol, and methanol
is not compatible with life all right. So the reason
I'm bringing that up is there all this stuff has
to be considered, okay, So when they're doing the talks
panel on her, they're going to look for any kind
of weird manifestation in the results. She has not This
(37:44):
has not happened long enough ago for that panel to
have come back yet. I can almost dollars to donuts.
I can almost guarantee that and the standard line. I'll
go ahead and state right here, we're probably looking at
six weeks unless they're trying to get to sing expedite
or here's another thing that might happen, todave. I didn't
think about this. The FBI may have got no samples.
(38:07):
They may have gotten no samples and sent them to
Quantico Okay for an expedited, expedited testing on her. Because
this is something that occurred in international waters, Isn't that's
something to think about, I know, because you know that
it might not be completely relying upon Miami Dade. You know,
Miami Dade has their own cases, dude. You know they
got a pretty robust case case a log that comes
(38:29):
from Miami Dade.
Speaker 3 (38:30):
And think about, Joe, if this happened in international waters,
Miami Dade, who has control over this. I mean, they
came to port here, but that's not where it happened. Maybe,
I mean what I'm guessing. I'm not a lawyer, don't
even pretend to be one. But I have to wonder
who's really in charge. The FBI has grabbed this and
they are doing it like they're in charge, but I wonder,
(38:51):
you know, but.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Hey, let's just know. Yeah, And that's the thing about it,
the timing here, And I don't know. I don't know
enough about what's referred to as admiral law. And I
think that there is a portion obviously of admiralty law
that goes to criminality, you know, on the high seeds.
You know, who's going to have jurisdiction over that. My
suspicion is because having work cases that put in into
(39:14):
New Orleans, if there was a homicide that was perpetrated
on a boat, it was going to be up to
the locals to handle that. In the past, maybe they're
deferring to the FEDS. I might be talking at school,
but that's my thought here. You look at this and
you think, and again, I ain't an attorney, have no desire.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
To anyone by the way.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
The you know, I'm thinking, are there any kind of
international laws that would apply here relative to if you're
going to prosecute a homicide? And who's going to wind
up prosecuting I think that if the FBI is tasked
we're working this case, they're going to be the ones
that if there is some if there is an arrest
affected in this case, they're going to be one putting
(39:57):
the bracelests on whoever it is. We've got this beautif
full eighteen year old young woman who has died on
board a literal floating city, surrounded by perhaps five thousand people,
with her family, and right now your guess is just
(40:21):
as good as mine. We have no answers, but I
guarantee you this, When we get those answers, Brother Dave
and I are going to come right back at you
and we're going to fill you in and hopefully fill
in all the blanks. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan, and this
is body Bags
Host
Joseph Scott Morgan
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.