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Jim Todd
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Ashley Banfield
Hey everyone. Check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
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Ashley Banfield
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.
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Ashley Banfield
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Ashley Banfield
Hey everyone, I'm Ashley Banfield. This is drop dead serious. Thank you for being here. Boy, do I have something to tell you tonight. I just learned something I had heard about before, could never confirm, and now I'm hearing it from probably the best source, or at least one of the best sources I've had on the story of Lynette Hooker, missing in the Abacos in the Bahamas. You already know that her lying husband, Brian Hooker says she just bounced off the back of the dinghy and I never saw her again. Right. And then everybody has had to, you know, launch hell and high water to try to find Lynette, only to realize his story's so preposterous. Now we're really finding all the evidence to prove him wrong. And I just found something, as it turns out, somewhere around 9:30 at night. And that would be more than two hours after Brian and Lynette left the Abaco Inn. And only minutes later she bounced off the back of the boat and he floated to Marsh harbor. And you know, you know the rest of the story. 9:30 Post 9:30 at night when nobody has been on Soulmate. Right, their 46 foot sloop that they live aboard for the last four years. That's where the dinghy was headed when all hell broke loose. They never made it to soulmate. Well, around 9:30 at night, a witness reported hearing a massive splash off of that boat. Because that boat was only parked about 100 yards offshore and there are some lovely homes right there. And that witness, she heard a big splash and it was so significant that it registered with her. Not only that, I have a little more detail about those flares. Remember the flares that a group of witnesses said that they saw a flare around 8 o' clock at night. The timing may be off, but there's more resolution to the flare story now. And it's about the direction of the flare because I've always said if a flare went up into the sky, everybody would have seen it. We would have had so many more reports. But now I'm finding out why we may not have. All of this comes to us from Jim Todd, who is a volunteer with Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue. I have said this about them before. They are entirely volunteer. They are entirely donation based. Please give generously to Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue because those guys are heroes. And Jim Todd is a hero. He is a saint. In the story of getting justice for Lynette Hooker, Jim Todd was one of the first people to pull Brian up onto the rescue boat after he'd been marooned on Shore at 4 o' clock in the morning after floating across the sea of Abaco after losing his wife. You know the story. Jim Todd rescued this guy, brought him up onto the rescue vessel and said, let's go find your wife. Went to Soulmate with him right away and he's got something to say about the timing, about when they got up next to Soulmate and what happened within the hour that they were there. It is big news. It is coming in just a moment. You're going to hear from him. The discrepancy about Brian Hooker telling his mother in law that he beached up on Marsh harbor after a terrifying night at sea, having no power because Lynette bounced out with the keys. Bullshit. Bullshit. And then when he was beached up on Marsh harbor, he went knocking on two doors, nobody answered, then flag down a vehicle who just took off without him. Well, Jim Todd is about to tell you why that too is a hundred percent preposterous, almost impossible, in fact, totally implausible, far fetched, inconceivable. These are the words from a stoic and mindful rescue officer who said the story that Brian Hooker told his mother in law about trying to get help doesn't work. You're going to hear him say every reason why and tell you logistically why it couldn't have happened that way. And while all of this new information is coming in, I can tell you this. Everything that you saw at the Coast Guard station in Fort Pierce, Florida. The. The pictures that we got first. The pictures we got of them towing the soulmate in and then putting it up at the dock. Then CGIS agents, United States Coast Guard Investigative Service. Those agents going on and off the boat, carrying things, wrapping it in crime scene tape. Well, guess what. Word is, is that they got a gold mine. Forensic gold mine. Like shit is getting real. Brian Hooker. First of all, we know that they had computers and tablets, everything, everything on board. We knew that. We already knew that. All we wondered was, did he take those things off? Because he had four days after Lynette went missing to the point where he went into detention and then got seriously scared about being in the Bahamas and bounced right out of there. What was he able to do to the boat? What did he take out of there? If he took anything, because he's not charged with anything right yet. Tick talk. But there was a lot on that boat, A lot. Like, we know for a fact the two engines that we've seen with our own eyes, those have telemetrics, those models, basically, you can hook them up to your phone to say, how much time do I have left on my electric engine? And all the rest of the. So two engines. I wonder if he still had one on board. I wonder if maybe one could be switched out for the other and then put back on to make it look like it didn't go anywhere. Bahamians still have the dinghy and one of the engines. I wonder if they were able to get an engine down in the hold when they raided the boat. They sure carried a lot of stuff off board. And you know what? Brian was a. How do I say this? Tech nerd geek geeking out, networking the boat. Lynette said in one of her discussions with family, yeah, so there's a lot on that boat. And from what we are hearing, it was a gold mine for investigators. I want you to now listen to this incredibly insightful conversation. It is the third time I have now spoken with Jim Todd from Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue. Give generously, please. And each time he calls me to say that he's just learned more information, that opens up a whole other can of worms. And, boy, is this a can of worms. Here's my conversation with Jim. Jim, the latest information that we received from Darlene Hamlet, that's Lynette's mom. Was that Brian told her that after he washed up on shore in Marsh harbor, he knocked on two doors that didn't answer. What are the Chances that that actually
Jim Todd
happened, the chances of that are essentially zero. Because where we found the dinghy and where we found, where we observed him standing next to the dinghy early on that Sunday morning, we have a clear location of where that is in Marsh Harbor. And it is nothing but scrub bush, very thick scrub bush directly to the west. And if you walked a great distance hundreds of yards through thick brush, there's nothing there. There's eventually a little commercial building. And again, this would have been happening at 4 o' clock on Sunday, Sunday morning, there would be no lights back there. It would be like making a decision to walk through the deepest dark of darkest jungle, heading due west into the island. Where the other option is, if you wash up on this shore in your dinghy for the last 30 minutes, you will have seen, or even longer, you would have seen the boatyard at Calcutta, 150 yards to the north. And that boatyard is extremely brightly lit up at night. I mean, it's, it's a landmark at night. That boatyard is so lit up. So if you're coming across the water, whether you're being blown by the wind or blown and also paddling, the boatyard is a giant beacon. That's where to go. And if you were to get washed up on the beach, given the choice of going a reasonably short distance along the shore to the extremely bright lights and every reason to believe that there would be civilization and assistance, that's what you would do. The alternative would be to go south where there was almost inaccessible and no houses for a great, great distance, or to go west a great distance through the bush, virtually impossible.
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And Doug, there's nowhere I wouldn't go to help someone customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual, even if it means sitting front row at a comedy show.
Ashley Banfield
Hey, everyone. Check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
Jim Todd
Oh, no.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual. Together we're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Anyways, get a quote@libertymutual.com or with your local agent.
Ashley Banfield
Liberty, Liberty. Liberty. Liberty.
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Ashley Banfield
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Jim Todd
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Ashley Banfield
Visit your nearby Lowe's. So that I I'm trying to sort of get a beat on Brian, making sure that I think one of his texts he even to you is that did you check there's a subdivision back there? What is he referring to? Because I have heard that there is a subdivision around there somewhere. But where is it and how accessible is it?
Jim Todd
Yeah, that's a little bit different. That is further south from where the boat is, there is a community called Sweetings Village. And I might speculate that there's 30 houses in this area. Roads come from the main street in Marsh harbor out toward the shore. They don't come right up to the shoreline, but they come up near the shore. And so there is a community there. But you might remember that the green flotation device was found a couple of hundred yards south of the dinghy. And then Sweetings Village was in that area. But there's water inlets there that you wouldn't be able from the dinghy, you wouldn't be able to walk straight to that community because there's a little water inlet and again it's pitch black. And if you're stumbling your way south along the shore, it would be just virtually impossible to go. 150, 200 yards south in the pitch black along the shore with no beacon or nothing drawing you in. And then you would have hit an inlet and you would have again had to have turned west into the island and go through more jungle to get directed back in. So that subdivision would not have been a reasonable approach direction to go in at 4 o' clock on Sunday morning. And to your point, when he made a reference to me in a text message about the subdivision, if I recall correctly, it was in the context of where we found the flotation device.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah. Interesting that he knew right away that there was this subdivision near the flotation device. And was so surprised that the flotation device would float all the way across the Sea of Abaco with him just a couple hundred yards away.
Jim Todd
That was an odd statement when he said, I think he may have used the word incredible. He says it's incredible. What was the noun that he used? It was incredible that it was only 150 yards from me the whole time. It didn't strike me as all that incredible because that's the way the wind was blowing and.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, right. That's the flotation pattern. Unless you didn't float there or maybe you placed it there. So. So I mean, I think it is so critical to just summarize what you just said. If you're really, truly floating with no power and you are marooned and you are coming up on shore, presumably you've had a couple of hours watching those lights getting closer and closer. I think he might have even at some point have said that he tried to paddle to get towards the boatyard. And you would know full well. If you're trying to get to the boatyard, paddling or hoping to get to where bright lights are instead of dark jungle, your first inclination will not to be to walk away from the lights. It would be to walk towards the civilization.
Jim Todd
Right. It's overwhelmingly obvious. It would be like if someone said I need to walk a hundred miles to the east, but I'm going to walk 13,000 miles to the west and end up in the same place. It was just overwhelmingly obvious. That's where civilization is. It's so well lit up that that's where help is going to be. And it's just incomprehensible that somebody would not go toward the light when they were only. The dinghy was only about 150 yards, if I recall, may have been a little bit longer further about 150 yards by the way.
Ashley Banfield
Brings me to the point where if you were going to. He did say something to Blaine. I think at some point. Blaine Stevenson, he. He said I had to really bushwhack my way through. I'm paraphrasing here, but effectively what I recall from the statement was I really had to get through the thicket getting through all of this jungle to get to that boatyard. Couldn't you just go right along the shore?
Jim Todd
Yeah. And there was. You would have gone straight along the shore. The shore would have been rough. But as I recall, if there is brush that comes out on all the way to the shore, it's just small little growths out to the shore. It's mostly walking along rocks to the boatyard area.
Ashley Banfield
He also mentioned something to Darlene about the rocks being very sharp on his feet. And I remember you telling me something very specific about what Brian was wearing when you rescued him that morning just a few hours after he went up on the shore. What was he wearing? That sort of doesn't go well with the whole description of the rocks being sharp on his feet.
Jim Todd
He was wearing. I think the phrase that people use is sliders, but like a flip flop.
Ashley Banfield
Slides.
Jim Todd
Slides. Okay. He was wearing slides and they're fairly common down here. What maybe people would think of as flip flops or something like that. Some of the rock can be rough and in pitch dark it would be challenging to walk across the rock. Sometimes people refer to it as moon rock because it's kind of spiky from thousands of years of erosion. But the flip flops or the slides would have made it, you know, very practical to work your way across the rocks. You certainly wouldn't decide to go inland through the almost impenetrable bush versus staying on the rocks on the shore.
Ashley Banfield
And you'd keep your slides on while going over all that rough rock. And by the way, Nathan has showed us incredible video of what that rock really looks like. It does look very sharp. You keep your slides on? Sure.
Jim Todd
Yeah, you definitely keep them on.
Ashley Banfield
So Jim, just again to revisit the. The option for a slides clad Brian Hooker washing up on shore would be to go to the bright lights of the civilization off to the right about 150 yards that he's been watching as he's been floating slowly closer and closer to Marsh Harbor. Or to go into the blue blackness which if you look from Google maps you might say, sure, there's a subdivision close by. But realistically and topographically, if you're a local who knows better, it's almost unreachable on foot from where he landed that dinghy.
Jim Todd
Yeah, that's exactly right. I mean it's almost like it's. You pose the question as option one and option two. There really isn't an option two. If. If you're 150 yards from the bright lights, you obviously would go to the bright lights versus the dark bush.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah, I have a much more coarse way of saying it. I say it's bullshit. I'm sure you have a more eloquent way of putting it. What would that be?
Jim Todd
Inconceivable. Might be a way of saying it's inconceivable that someone would go either way west or south when there's an extremely well lit boatyard 150 yards to the north.
Ashley Banfield
Talk to me a little bit about the idea of knocking on doors. Let's just say he made the inconceivable trip. Would there only be two doors to knock on? Because I thought there were close to 30 in that subdivision.
Jim Todd
Yeah, there is something about something like 30. I would just make a guess. There's three, I believe, three long streets from the more major street along the subdivision. The distance of the subdivision, and there's houses on both sides. And if someone were to get onto the paved, these paved roads, you would go to the first house and knock on the door. And then. And then you would just walk up the street. And this street is fairly long. Each one of these three streets is fairly long. But once you're on the street, you would stay on it and just knock on doors. Now, it's not like a tight subdivision, so it's not like there's a house every quarter acre. But you just walk up the street knocking on doors until you roused somebody. You wouldn't try. You wouldn't try two doors in this. And then, and then, and then turn around and go the other way.
Ashley Banfield
All the way back to the boat yard.
Jim Todd
Right back through the difficult terrain that you would have had to cross to get to the subdivision.
Ashley Banfield
Right. And let's just say you decided not to go through that horrible journey through the thickets and the, you know, the inlet that you'd have to cross. You decided to go out via the roadway. That is a hell of a long walk to go out via the roadway. Yeah. None of it makes sense. But then also, these are homes that are occupied. These aren't like big, expensive vacation homes that people are sometimes in for a month or so a year. These are people who live there in these homes in Marsh Harbor.
Jim Todd
Yeah, absolutely. These are not vacation homes. They are real people who live and work here. There are hardworking Bahamians who. This is their. Their life and they're here all the time.
Ashley Banfield
And they would have answered the door to a man who was in distress, who had just been marooned on the beat, you know, on the shore of Marsh Harbor. Yeah.
Jim Todd
I mean, they would have answered the door and given help, and if they were concerned, they would have called the police and brought help.
Ashley Banfield
Yes. Let's talk about this vehicle, the mystery man that I put out an appeal to on the podcast. If it was you, call me. I don't expect a call anytime soon. Soon. What did you make of this story that I waved down a passing car. 4am in a remote area of Marsh harbor where I don't know that there are any roads near where he washed up and the car just took off.
Jim Todd
Extremely far fetched. I mean, again, the probability approaches zero because again, at 4am on Sunday morning on these streets in Sweeting's Village and also a street a little bit further north, I don't know the name of it, but it's a street with an industrial building on it. At 4am in the morning, there's really, there's not going to be anybody out. And generally speaking, everybody down here is very helpful and it's a small community and if someone were standing in the road, the, that appeared to be in distress, you would stop and at the very least you'd stop and roll down the window a little bit and have some communication and then use your telephone to bring them aid.
Ashley Banfield
So yeah, you'd call the police, you do something.
Jim Todd
Yeah, if, if the statement is. If the statement. Well, yeah, it's hard to even refer to statements when they get so far from. But to say that he made it through the bush to a street and waved somewhat attempted to wave someone down, as we understand it, it's just extremely far fetched.
Ashley Banfield
Well, and let's remind everybody again, the community in the Abacos is very small and it is not 1970s New York City where you might drive by someone in distress.
Jim Todd
Right. And this story is well known that as you said, if someone saw themselves being waved down and then didn't stop for fear, they would probably step forward now at this point
Ashley Banfield
and say it was me, I was that one. I was afraid. I didn't stop and I wish I had. Yeah.
Jim Todd
As the story as we understand it, it's extremely far fetched.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah. What's frustrating, Jim, so much of this is frustrating. But what's frustrating when I speak with you is how hard you and your fellow volunteers at the Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue give generously. Please. I'm going to say it again, please. It's entirely volunteer Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue. How hard you all worked for days looking for Lynette based on false information, incomplete information obfuscation. And then a guy who was sitting on the porch of the Conk Inn for two days and not going and getting a boat to join in the search.
Jim Todd
That's quite a contrast, isn't it? And people here, I mean we had people call who a Bahamian, a second homeowner who lives on Elbow Key. And they know my wife Cindy and they called Cindy and said our family has property on a string of keys near Tolu Cut and there's a blown out building from years back and has a cistern on it. And I've just got a feeling about that cistern. Somebody should check it out. And so Cindy got in her kayak and paddled a long way, I don't know, maybe three miles. So she paddled in her kayak three miles down to this string of keys and she from, you know, at this point she's five feet away from the shore, she can get as close as she wants to. And she circled these three keys right up close and then went to the key that had the blown away dwelling from many years ago. And she could see that the cistern was completely overgrown with access to the cistern was completely overgrown. And she that told her she didn't need to make an attempt to go find the cistern because it was essentially inaccessible. But I just said that as a point of People are working hard to try and think about
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Ashley Banfield
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Jim Todd
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Jim Todd
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Ashley Banfield
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Jim Todd
be searching and they're communicating to people who have an ability to do it. And so Cindy went and did it and consequently was able to presumably eliminate that as a potential area. And that's just one instance of many. I was really happy to see how thoroughly Nate had looked at the west, the northwest side of Lovers, because I think that that is number one or number two, highest likely area if a body is buried. That's one of the high likelihood areas. And to the credit of not. Not me, but other colleagues on Fire and Rescue. On Sunday morning, one of our colleagues had drones flying all over the northern tip of Lovers quarters on the west side and on the northern tip and on the east side and across the middle of the island. And he was able to navigate the drones right up close to the shore. So there was a thorough look for anything that had been washed up. And so.
Ashley Banfield
Well. And of course, what everyone's looking for is what they believe at the time is woman who went overboard and may be stranded and needing help, or God forbid, might be a body that washed up on the shore. They're not looking for potential grave sites, which is a very different kind of look.
Jim Todd
That's right. That's right. And that's actually, if there's a body buried, I think that one of the higher probability places, I believe they have sent cadaver dogs there would be the northwest shore of a. On Elbow Key of a development called the Sanctuary. And it's right, you're familiar with it. You've seen it when you're going west out of the White Sound channel, that little peninsula on the left, they're doing a lot of road grading, a lot of palm tree planting, and a lot of churning the ground. And I have water, walked that area, driven it, and many others have also. And the challenge there is that everything looks like a grave because all of the dirt has been.
Ashley Banfield
It's all disturbed.
Jim Todd
It's all disturbed. Right. And I don't know at firsthand, but I understand that the cadaver, The US Coast Guard cadaver dogs did go there.
Ashley Banfield
Well, I knew. I know for a fact, having seen them, because I was there at the time. They were looking at that entire area again. As you exit White sound channel, turn left, turn south. There's sort of a bunch of mangroves and like low lying cliff, like, you know, rock formations along the water. And they were very, very interested in that spot. It's a matter of access, you know, accessing it, which was tricky for them. And one dog, you know, can only do so much. You know, those puppies. Dogs get. Get tired and overworked in the hot Bahamian sun. So my hope is that there will be additional searching. And I'm crossing my fingers for that. That's a story that's coming in the days to come. But, you know, Brian said something to you about lovers, didn't he?
Jim Todd
Yeah. Refresh my memory if there's something specific you're thinking of.
Ashley Banfield
But he said he told you that. He told you that his plan was to land on Lubbers and then break into some houses or something of that sort.
Jim Todd
Right. So he. On Sunday morning, I was on the front of the rescue boat. He and I had a lengthy discussion about where he believes Lynette went over the side on the dinghy. And in the process of trying to identify that, he. He said he drifted to the northern tip of Lovers. He finally threw out an anchor and he stayed anchored there approximately an hour. He fired one flare or two Flares. Flares. He. He fired a flare. One or more. I. I can't speak to the quantity, but he fired a flare from.
Ashley Banfield
He told Darlene he fired two flares. And there's information that he only fired one. That. That the actual flare may have only fired one. I don't have that a hundred percent confirmed, but there is information that only one flare went out of that gun. But he said to Darlene that he fired.
Jim Todd
Right. So he fired a flare or a combination of flares. And then eventually he told me. And so I had my one broken oar and I decided I would paddle to the northern tip of Lubbers and find a house and break in and use the telephone to call for help. And when I raised the anchor to get to Lubbers, I was unable to get to make land and then consequently got blown west to where he came up on the beach. That's what he.
Ashley Banfield
Can I ask you something about that? I have not boated over the northern part of Lubbers quarters. However, others who have told me that there is a massive shoal that goes out, that it is extremely shallow all over the northern tip. So if you're at the northern tip of Lubbers, you could theoretically get out and stand.
Jim Todd
Yes, probably 50 yards out, there's a good chance that you could stand up. It's very shallow. No one in a boat would go close to the north northern tip of Lovers because it's known to be short and to be shallow. And then from that point, the northern tip of Lovers, as you go west, there's then a massive sandbark that heads toward Marsh Harbor. And a bigger boat would not loop around to the west side of Lubbers. But if you're in a dinghy, it would be. If you're in a dinghy with a
Ashley Banfield
motor, you do that and more.
Jim Todd
Then it would be easy to simple.
Ashley Banfield
So and the other thing is for, for people who aren't boaters or liveaboards or cruisers or sailors or anything, all the words you want to ascribe to people who spend a lot of time on boats in areas where they become familiar, comfortable, enjoy and then move on. If you're in a keelboat that draws about, I'm just going to guess that a 46 foot sloop draws about 4 to 6ft.
Jim Todd
That's right. He actually mentioned that when we talked. He said his boat drew about five feet.
Ashley Banfield
Okay, so I'm right on. And that was a real guess. You're going to know this. You are going to know where these very shallow shoals are and sandbars are because you are sailing in the Abacos and this is a very key part of the Abacos. It's not like you just wouldn't know that if you're drifting over it at night.
Jim Todd
No, no, that's exactly right. If you were in a 43 foot sailboat and you're coming through an area for the first time and you're enjoying your vacation and your cruising and you have a five foot keel, five feet is actually kind of, kind of deep in our area. You really have to pay attention. And he would know that, he would have known that if he had been here for two weeks because he would have already hit bottom and realized, okay, I really have to be circumspect. And that west side of Lubbers on a chart. And visually when you're looking at it from a distance is extremely appealing. I mean it would be a magnet of I've got to anchor back here behind Lovers on the west side. It's just so pristine.
Ashley Banfield
Visually appealing. Not so much on the chart.
Jim Todd
You would look at it in the chart and say, oh no, I can't do that. It would be a clear no go and you wouldn't have to be very experienced or sophisticated. To know that you can't get there by a boat.
Ashley Banfield
You mean like a guy who is able to text you saying, ebb tides, slack tide, midnight tide. Someone who knows the tides, to use that kind of terminology, would know enough about depth in a very appealing spot to say, you know, we've been by that place a bunch of times. Crossing Sea of Abaco from Marsh harbor over to Elbow Key. You got to be really careful and avoid that spot.
Jim Todd
Yeah. And there is. On the northwest tip of Lubbers, there are two little beaches that by observation on. Either by observation on a chart or maybe even more clearly on Google Maps on your phone, you can see that they're beaches. And if you're looking for something with softer sand versus rock, there's. There's an attraction there, if that's what you were looking for.
Ashley Banfield
Well, and Nathan is looking again, when looking, it all depends on what you're looking for. If you're looking for Lynette's dry bag, if you're looking for Lynette's bathing suit, cover up. If you're looking for her conch Republic headscarf, or if you're looking for what looks like potentially a grave, and that's really hard in the sand. But I will say this. Anyone who's out looking should be watching very, very closely, and this is a very macabre topic, but you should be watching very closely for some kind of concavity, some kind of indentation in the sand, because as a body that might be buried decomposes, they break down, and the sand or earth above them is displaced and often falls. That's why you can sometimes see where a shallow grave is, because it's not even with the rest of the earth. It droops in where the body has, you know, displaced that. That earth. So if anyone's out looking, make sure to look for that. And maybe some brush that looks, you know, piled very unnaturally on top of one spot, not what the wind or the, you know, the. The surf would bring in, but somebody would actually physically have to pile something in a formation like that.
Jim Todd
And, you know, if somebody had some digging to do on the shore, maybe it would take an hour. And that's why the story of I anchored there for an hour in case the dinghy had been observed.
Ashley Banfield
But it's a really good point.
Jim Todd
There's. So the problem is that. Well, maybe not the problem. The challenge is the story that he's told is so obviously, cumulatively, obviously not true.
Ashley Banfield
I go further. I say preposterous, right?
Jim Todd
I Mean, you know, I had Vaughn. I had math training in my past. And it's a statistical issue of to believe his story, you have to believe this and this and this and this and this. And in statistics, you have to multiply them together. And when you multiply fractions together, it becomes an increasingly smaller number. So the believability of falling out in broad daylight, swimming away from. And swimming away from the boat in broad daylight and deciding not to throw a life jacket out when there's life jackets in the bottom of the boat getting in the way, and not throwing an anchor out until you've drifted. And, and. And all those come up to the probability approaches zero.
Ashley Banfield
Oh, I'll add to you if you're driving, which he says, lynette was in terrible seas, and yet she's not the usual driver. You're the one who would be driving. But, okay, let's give him that. If she's about to bounce out, her hand is on the throttle, and the other hand is likely stabilizing herself on the pontoon. And somehow both of those hands, as she's bouncing out, are able to grab the lanyard with the electric key on it and the dry bag, which is likely in the well of the dinghy because it's one of those longer strapping ones, and it would really kind of displace you and make your weight uneven if you had it strapped on you while you're driving. Most people don't put a cross bag on while driving a dinghy like that. They put it in the bottom of the boat, especially if they're driving in conditions like that. So, again, I mean, every ounce of what he says is garbage.
Jim Todd
And when you have all of those things have to be true for the story to be true. And that's what makes it so diminishingly likely. However, on the other side, all of the potential things that he could have done, or. There's so many possibilities, the probability of any one of them is relatively small. Except now, statistically speaking, we're not multiplying the probability of each one. We're adding the probability because we're saying it could have been this, or she could be buried here, or. And when you use the word or, then you add the probabilities together, and then you get this collection of potential stories, and collectively, one of them is true. And it may be that we don't have the imagination yet to get to the. To the right story.
Ashley Banfield
Well, it's like Puff the Magic Dragon to get to the story that he tells. Think all those Natural products you're buying are from wholesome mom and pop companies. Eh, not quite. Many have been bought out by mega corporations and private equity firms who hijack the brands and load them all up with corporate slope. But one company is doing things differently. The Van man company. They started the grass fed tallow trend a few years back with moisturizers and they've been crushing it ever since with their nearly edible products. Tallow works because its fatty acids are nearly identical to the oils in our own skin, so our bodies actually recognize it. It can replace your lotion, your night cream, your wrinkle cream, even Neosporin and diaper balm. And it's powerful enough to heal your skin, yet safe enough to spread on your toast. Real ingredients ready to ditch the corporate chemicals. Just go to Vanman Shop Banfield and use my code banfield to get 15% off your first order. Again, that's Vanman Shop Banfield. Use my code Banfield. 15% off your first order. You can always go to the description, click the link right there. Van man, real ingredients, no exceptions. I do want to ask you, when you came back to Soulmate, having rescued this marooned Brian Hooker from Marsh Harbor, I remember you saying he got up on your vessel, the rescue vessel, sometime around 7:30 or so in the morning. What time do you think you got up to his sailboat and then tied your rescue vessel up alongside Soulmate, at which point he scrambled above and then, you know, messed around with that air conditioning unit, presumably to get a. Hide a key because he said he had to break into his own boat because Lynette had the keys. What time do you think that might have been that, you know, he's getting up on board and then getting down below with that police officer.
Jim Todd
I recall pretty clearly that we left Marsh harbor with the. With Brian Hooker and the police officers, approximately 7:25. It's a pretty close on a boat. It's pretty quick trip. And we would have been tied up to the side of his boat in the range of 7:45.
Ashley Banfield
So he's getting up on board now around 7:45 and tinkering with the air conditioner again, presumably to get the Heideke to open up and break into his own boat to go down below with the police officer. That would have taken how long?
Jim Todd
Oh, I remember it was maybe for him to gain access. From tinkering to gaining access, probably less than a minute, not very long.
Ashley Banfield
Okay, quickly. All right, so about 7:45, give or take a few minutes. He's going down below with the officer.
Jim Todd
That's right.
Ashley Banfield
And he's down there till 8:45?
Jim Todd
Yeah, that's a pretty strong estimate on my part, but that's what I would guess at. Yes.
Ashley Banfield
I've measured that up against his AIs, which went so you know, it's looked at by, you know, my ship tracking as a vessel event. But at 9:29pm the night before it went out and at 8:34am it went back on. And so it's entirely possible as he's coming back out with the police officer, he could have switched back on his AIs and walked out above deck, got back onto your vessel and then gone off looking for Lynette.
Jim Todd
Sure, he would have had access to all of his controls. And
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Jim Todd
You know, I assumed that at some point he was at the behest of the police officer, rummaging around looking for paperwork and doing things and presumably it would be easy to turn on his AIs. And this is the first time I've heard you're telling me that on Saturday
Ashley Banfield
night at what time the AIs 9:29pm his AIs went out of coverage 9:29pm and it remained out of coverage until 8:34am the next morning when it went back on.
Jim Todd
Well, the 834 data point is extremely reasonable. I would say. Yeah, we were there for that 834 data point. But it's a shocking bit of information that is AIs was, I don't want to use the wrong words, but was turned off or disabled out of coverage.
Ashley Banfield
That's out of coverage is the way that they, it's logged as the, as the event.
Jim Todd
Yeah.
Ashley Banfield
Listen, I, I'm wondering if you're sitting in the rescue vessel for that hour with the other Hopetown volunteer fire and rescue members and the other police officers, do you recall any of your observations? Like did you recall any kind of power event, hearing anything going on or lights coming on or anything at all, sometime just before they emerged from down below?
Jim Todd
No, observed nothing. The engine was not cranked, did not observe. It was broad daylight, so I probably wouldn't observe lights coming on, but there was no indication that there was a power being turned on or turned off.
Ashley Banfield
When you approach the vessel, sometimes there's motion sensor triggers that turn spike spotlights on on some of these boats. Did any of that happen that you recall?
Jim Todd
No, nothing. We, we approached from the stern of the boat and tied up along the starboard side of the boat and I did not notice any lights come on.
Ashley Banfield
Well, if the boat had been powered down, that might make sense that there's no power to those, those lights. So who knows what this event was with aisle, you know, out of coverage might have meant all power off. Who knows what it meant? Maybe the AIs just turned off. We don't know. But the other thing I wanted to ask you about, Jim, when I'm sitting on a boat, I'm usually enjoying the waves of the view. But if I'm sitting up beside a sailboat, I'm usually looking at the rigging because I'm really curious about, you know, how people rig their boats, how many stays, you know, all the rest. Was there anything about the rigging that stood out to you, did you see cameras or spotlights or any kind of stuff that would have just been sort of. Well, that's interesting.
Jim Todd
No, the only thing that I observed that approaches that is that I would say that the boat was tricked out for heavy cruising. It had a lot of solar panels on one side. And when you see the sailing boats here in the Sea of Abaco, you can see very quickly a boat that is set up for an easy sail through the Sea of Abaco, a relatively easy sail back to Florida. They don't have a lot of the more external equipment, but this boat was decked out with more preparation for a more serious journey. I feel like I can remember seeing water bottles or diesel bottles tied onto the deck of the boat. Maybe I'm mistaken there, but that would be a common feature of boats that were rigged up to be a little more heavy duty. And it was certainly rigged that way.
Ashley Banfield
But no, feeling like, oh, they're cameras. We better watch our P's and Q's. I can see that we're on camera. Or at least these little what some people call nest or ring cameras set up on the riggings.
Jim Todd
Yeah, I did not notice that, But I'll also say I'm not attuned to notice that either.
Ashley Banfield
Well, you're in rescue mode. You shouldn't have been. I mean, honest to God, you're looking for Lynette. You're not looking for what a criminal might be up to. So it can be forgiven. That's absolutely for sure.
Jim Todd
A couple of days ago, I was watching some videos, and I observed. I watched a video of an expert who says, here's how you tell when somebody is lying. They have a pretty detailed story, and they're good at explaining the details to the story. And if you ask them about the details, they're very insightful. But if you ask them according to question adjacent to the story, then it stumps them. And when I saw this video a few days ago, it made me think of us understanding a pretty detailed story of what happened that night. But then when I was on the deck of Fire and Rescue, literally quizzing him, did she fall out here or was it closer to here? When she fell out, did she swim to this piece of land or that piece of land? And as you know, as I've mentioned to you before, he said, I don't know. I'm just so confused. And it made me, when I heard this video, that it made me feel like he was presented with a question that he didn't. He hadn't worked out his story for. And so he had to say. He was only able to say, I don't know, because he didn't have that piece of the story worked out. Another thing that makes no sense is I don't recall him ever saying that she swam to the sailboat, but I do believe that he told others that she was swimming to the sailboat. I cannot attest to that. So when I was in this area, pointing to the land, it's. It's obvious that she would swim. If she wasn't going to swim back to the dinghy 10ft away, then the land is so close. Well, why would he think she fell out of the boat? Historia she fell out of the boat. He heard her yell something and he didn't know what she said. Well, why would he think she was swimming to the sailboat? Since they didn't have a conversation about it, he would think that she was swimming to the closest point, which was the land. Just another example of he said she was swimming to the sailboat, but he had no reason to think she was swimming to the sailboat. They didn't talk about it, and the land was close.
Ashley Banfield
Well, let me tell you the discrepancies in what he's told multiple people, including yourself. One version is I called out to her and I heard her call back, but I couldn't make out what she was saying. And the other version is I, I called out to her, but I never heard from her. And another version is I didn't know where she was swimming. But yet another version is she was swimming towards the sailboat. And yet here we are, Jim, you and I, sensible people. And even if you're not a sensible boater, they were 150 yards offshore in a very shallow area. It might have been 5ft. Swimming a little closer to shore, it might have been 3.3ft. And they knew that because they had been in this area back and forth multiple times.
Jim Todd
And so, you know, it's, it's. The story is so implausible. Implausible to me, it shifts over to, okay, how do we figure out how to think about what could have happened? What really happened? And. Yeah, I don't know. I understand. I'm sure you're aware of it. I understand secondhand that someone observed a flare coming from the sailboat, but not the dinghy. I understand someone heard a distinctly loud splash from the area of the sailboat, and I know that that person is in contact with authorities and that that, in a sense, that's old news.
Ashley Banfield
Well, it isn't, actually. I do want to pull on that thread a little bit. There are people who have spoken to authorities who didn't want to speak publicly. Understand, not everybody wants to be speaking to podcasts or speaking to the media at all. But this is information that you know that there is a witness who saw a flare and heard a commotion and a splash.
Jim Todd
It's actually two different people in the same area. But yes.
Ashley Banfield
Can you expound on that a little bit more?
Jim Todd
One person saw a flare come from the boat, from the area of the sailboat. A different person in the same group heard the splash.
Ashley Banfield
And they were close enough to be able to hear that?
Jim Todd
Yes.
Ashley Banfield
Were they on land or on a boat? Yes, land on land. Was it dark when that happened?
Jim Todd
I saw a photograph from approximately. Yeah, it was dark when that happened. I was mixing stories. It was dark when that happened.
Ashley Banfield
So I have a report that approximately 8pm was when a group saw the flare and more than one person saw the flare. Is this a different. Do you. Do you recall differently?
Jim Todd
That's the same group that we're referring to.
Ashley Banfield
And did more than one person see the flare or just one person saw a flare and another person heard the splash?
Jim Todd
As it was told to me, one person saw the flare. I never spoke to that person. So that is secondhand information to me. Me, I did speak to another person in that group and that person told me they heard the splash.
Ashley Banfield
Did they hear any screaming or fighting?
Jim Todd
No, that was the only sound that they heard. It was just. And it was extremely loud and distinctive. A big splash into the. The water.
Ashley Banfield
And that's why they remembered it, because it would be odd at 8 o' clock at night for anyone to be jumping in the water. Did it sound like it was a person going in the water or something like large equipment going in the water?
Jim Todd
She didn't made no reference to characterizing the sound of the splash other than being a very, very loud splash.
Ashley Banfield
Was there any other recollection of that, that time, that moment right around 8 o' clock at night?
Jim Todd
No, no. My understanding was that the splash was a little bit later.
Ashley Banfield
No, it's not dark at 7:47. It's dark at 8. Yeah, 740.
Jim Todd
I've seen a photo from 747 and it was very bright. Not very bright, but clearly light. I understand.
Ashley Banfield
Very calm. Well, no, we don't, because it's not. It's not dark at 7:47. Oh, you're saying you're seeing the light. You're seeing the. It looks like a reflection, but it's actually light at 747. I think they're getting up on board at that time. This, this event, what the, what the witnesses saw is in the darkness.
Jim Todd
Yeah.
Ashley Banfield
Correct, Jim. There's nothing happening in the light.
Jim Todd
Right.
Ashley Banfield
But that. You saw a picture. Sorry, you saw a picture at 7:47pm and I've seen the same one and it is dead calm. I mean it is lovely, the weather is beautiful and there's not a ripple.
Jim Todd
That is correct. We must have seen the same photo.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah. And it would be shortly after that, little more than say 10 minutes later, that the witness saw the flare.
Jim Todd
I can't. The flare was the second hand story and so, I mean to me it was secondhand and so I really don't have a sharp timing on that.
Ashley Banfield
And even though it's secondhand, did they say the flare went straight up into the sky or laterally along the water which would make it hard for other people to see?
Jim Todd
Was said to have gone horizontally across the water or sideways?
Ashley Banfield
Horizontally. Well that makes a lot of sense because we've not been able to figure out how a flare could have been seen by a witness that wasn't seen by all the other houses that look out onto the Sea of Abaco. All of the other boats had anchorage. I mean flares are a big thing. They signal distress. And so if it went laterally that would be easy to miss.
Jim Todd
Yeah, in my understanding, my perception at the time, and I don't remember, I can't remember the qualitative parts of the discussion or conversation, but my sense at the time was that the flare was seen something like 9 to 9:30. But I can't back that up from conversation. That was my sense of the conversation.
Ashley Banfield
That's in, that's in direct competition with another story that says the flare was seen around 8pm yeah.
Jim Todd
And as I say, I'm, I'm talking about something that was told to me secondhand that I personally didn't ask a lot of follow up questions about. So it may be that. Well, so I just don't know.
Ashley Banfield
But the splash was definitely around 8.
Jim Todd
No, the splash was definitely later, maybe even past 9:30 because the person I was talking to said that the, the surroundings had become quiet so that one would have been able to hear a splash. Prior to that there was more general commotion, just general island life commotion on the land.
Ashley Banfield
So the Splash was after 9:30 when things had become more quiet and the splash would be easier to hear.
Jim Todd
Yes.
Ashley Banfield
Wow, that is a lot of information to process. Just super alarming but also fitting into a puzzle that, you know, that we've been working out. And that puzzle increasingly does not fit Brian Herker's story.
Jim Todd
Right. Yeah. And well, this goes to, to me, this goes so many data points there. The story is so implausible now it's trying to triangulate on what really did happen. And so if a flare was shot sometime after 8:00, and if there was a distinctly loud flash, excuse me, splash sometime later than 9 o', clock, maybe 9:30, then those are extremely compelling data points in what might have actually taken place.
Ashley Banfield
Yeah. Was there anything else that those witnesses said adjacent to these reports of the flare and the splash and. No. No fighting, no loud noises, no. Nothing else. That sort of just was an interesting data point.
Jim Todd
No, that's really 100% of what was said I've heard unrelated to these conversations that I have had. I've heard really I would almost classify as idle conversation or idle chat that, oh, someone said they saw people on the boat, but it was so idle chat and so far removed from a source. It could be true, but I don't think that I was at all close to who actually may have observed that. And more specifically
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Ashley Banfield
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Jim Todd
The people that I'm talking about right now made no comments remotely related to that. It was only a flare from the sailboat and a very loud splash.
Ashley Banfield
Because it was also dark, it'd be hard to see anybody on the boat at that point. However, listen, it game over. If anybody made it back to the Soulmate boat and got up on board. Game over. We. We already know Brian's story isn't true. It's just a matter of proving it with empirical and hard facts and evidence. But I'll tell you that this. This boat next door, Azura. This has been such a mystery. Has anyone on the island talked about Azura? Has anybody been able to find Azura to their knowledge?
Jim Todd
I've seen it posted on a local Facebook page here to try and pass the word, but I've not. I've not heard any conversation about it.
Ashley Banfield
Now, we can't find Azura anywhere. We found a lot of Azuras, and we've even knocked on the hull of a few Azuras that, you know, already traveled down to the Virgin Islands, and they were quite surprised to hear people looking for them, but they weren't the right Azura. Azura means light blue in Italian, I believe. And so anybody who's got the faintest light blue hull likes the name Azura for their boat. And so it's made it very hard for the Coast Guard and for people like us to find those neighbors to see if they heard or saw anything.
Jim Todd
Right? As I recall, there were not a lot of boats in that anchorage from where Soulmate was south toward Tahiti Beach. Sometimes that area really gets filled up with a lot of boats. And as I recall, there were not. It was, as far as the season goes, it was kind of light for the season on that day.
Ashley Banfield
Do you recall as you were pulling up that next morning on Easter morning, If there was a neighbor close by,
Jim Todd
my memory is that there was no boat to the. I'm pretty confident there was no boat to the. The north of Soulmate. And the next boat to the south, I would not describe as particularly close.
Ashley Banfield
That's interesting because Azura was north. From the photographs that we've seen, right off of Burl Ives old home, which is right there on the shore. Azura was parked right in front of there. And you're saying you don't recall any keelboat like Azura parked right there in front of Burl Ives home?
Jim Todd
Yeah, that's right. And I thought about that, how that could. How the puzzle pieces could go together. And sailors wake up early, these kind of sailboat cruisers. And there could have been a sailboat north of Soulmate, and they could have just. Per their own sail plan, they could have just left early and were gone by the time we got there at 7:45.
Ashley Banfield
Or they could have left the evening before for a different anchorage. Just hard to know when that neighbor was there. Jim, you have just been such a wealth of information, and you've been so helpful. Right since day one. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, you're a saint. Thank you for everything that you've done for Lynette Hooker. We are a community now, bonded forever. You, me, and everybody else watching. We all want justice forever for this.
Jim Todd
This mom, you know, Darlene and Carly. Darlene called me about a week ago. And you can just imagine she's trying to make. Get some sort of. Certainly all the obvious things of clarity and resolution, but she's so far away from clarity and resolution. She's just trying to get. Get some. Literally some texture, some texture to grab onto because she's drifting. I can only imagine she's in a house up in Michigan somewhere, and she has all of the long daylight hours with very little information, new information. So she constantly only has old information. So she and I had a very positive conversation. And, yeah, it just really makes you feel for the real people of the story of Darlene and Carly. And it's probably not appropriate for me to repeat it, but Darlene. So use your judgment, Ashley. But Darlene said the last time. She was. The last. The last time Lynette was with Darlene, Darlene said to me, I told her not to go back. He was going to kill her. And, you know, that's the place where Darlene is. And she had done everything she knew how to do to get Lynette to change course. And for a million complex reasons that didn't happen. And now Darlene is trying to get something to grab onto, knowing that she had done virtually everything she could.
Ashley Banfield
She did. She did do everything she possibly could. She even spoke with, you know, battered women's shelters for advice about how to get her daughter to reconsider returning back to Brian, which she had done many times and had a ticket March 11 to leave him again. And I just so wish she had used that ticket and she would have been there for Mother's Day.
Jim Todd
And anybody who's so. Anybody who's engaged with these kinds of dynamics knows that that is so difficult for someone, a woman in those circumstances to be able to pull away. And there's so many layers of
Ashley Banfield
no one knows. No one knows that the shoes they wear.
Jim Todd
Right, right. The mental handcuffs, the mental chains are so overwhelming. And obviously it was just so tragic in this regard. But to the extent that it makes a difference, as. As I've said, there are so many people here who are. Feel compassion toward Lynette and toward Darlene and Carlie that to the extent that people are able to help, they want to help and feel a connection.
Ashley Banfield
Absolutely. Well, thank you for everything you've done. And I know that we're going to speak again.
Jim Todd
Okay.
Ashley Banfield
Thank you, Jim.
Jim Todd
Take care. Thank you.
Ashley Banfield
So there you have it. My extraordinary thanks to Jim Todd. So much clarity, so much new information that just proves Brian Hooker is lying. So what else are you lying about, Brian? Where's Lynette? Tick fucking talk, buddy. If you know anything, I ask all the time. Drop deadserious infomail.com if you have any information you can add to what you've learned tonight. This episode. Drop dead seriousinfomail.com you can stay anonymous. We work all of your tips. They have been unbelievably helpful. Nathan, you have been amazing in your searches. I can't even begin to name everyone who's been so incredibly helpful. And Jim Todd, you're one of them. Thank you from the bottom of my heart and all of the hearts of everybody in this community. Thank you for being a part of this. Don't forget to subscribe. And please, please join our membership as well, because this has become a real village for Lynette Hooker and everybody else who we cover. Because victims of crime, and I believe Lynette is a victim of a crime. They deserve justice. They deserve to be heard. They deserve our attention. They deserve to be found and they deserve for the perpetrators to go down like a sinking sailboat. Thanks everyone for watching. Don't forget. Truth isn't just serious. It's drop dead serious.
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Ashley Banfield
Well, that's cool.
Jim Todd
No, you don't understand. It went perfectly. Real offer down to the penny. They're picking it up tomorrow. Nothing went wrong.
Ashley Banfield
So what's the problem?
Jim Todd
That is the problem. Nothing wrong in my life goes as smoothly. I'm waiting for the catch.
Ashley Banfield
Maybe there's no catch.
Jim Todd
That's exactly what a catch would want me to think. Wow.
Ashley Banfield
You need to relax.
Jim Todd
I need to knock on wood. Do we have wood? Is this table wood?
Ashley Banfield
I think it's laminate.
Jim Todd
Okay. Yeah. That's good. That's close enough.
Ashley Banfield
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Ashley Banfield
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Release Date: May 16, 2026
This gripping episode explores new revelations in the baffling case of Lynette Hooker, who went missing under highly suspicious circumstances in the Abacos, Bahamas. Veteran crime journalist Ashleigh Banfield uncovers bombshell evidence that challenges the implausible timeline given by Lynette’s husband, Brian Hooker. Through an in-depth interview with Jim Todd, a volunteer rescuer from Hopetown Volunteer Fire and Rescue, Banfield exposes inconsistencies in Brian’s story, details witness reports of a massive splash, and meticulously analyzes every clue in pursuit of truth and justice for Lynette.
Banfield’s hallmark irreverence is front and center, interlaced with empathetic appeals and biting skepticism. The episode is direct ("I say it's bullshit," “Tick fucking talk, buddy”) and doggedly investigative, with a tone oscillating between compassion for Lynette’s family and righteous anger at Brian Hooker’s conflicting stories.
This episode of Drop Dead Serious delivers dense investigative reporting, emotional resonance, and a sense of escalating urgency. The evidence is piling up: field-proven witness timings, expert analysis of the impossible geography, detailed forensic clues from Soulmate, and the unwavering commitment of local volunteers. The episode ends with an impassioned call for tips, justice for Lynette, and support for those dedicated to finding the truth.
If you have any information related to the disappearance of Lynette Hooker, contact: dropdeadseriousinfomail.com.