
Loading summary
Liberty Mutual Agent
Neighbor game. Oo.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
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.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Hey, everyone, check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Oh, no. We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Anyways, get a quote@libertymutual.com or with your local agent.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Liberty, Liberty. Liberty. Liberty.
Safeway/Albertsons Advertiser
Save on family essentials at Safeway and Albertsons. This week at Safeway and Albertsons, fresh cut cantaloupe, watermelon, pineapple or melon medley bowls. 24 ounces are $5 each and wild caught lobster tails are $4.99 each. Limit eight member price. Plus selected sizes and varieties of Doritos, Lays, Cheetos, sun chips and Kettle cook chips are $1.99 each. Limit four member price. Hurry in. These deals won't last. Visit Safeway or albertsons.com for more deals and ways to save.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Hey everybody, I'm Ashley Banfield and this is drop dead serious. I have a whole lot more to tell you about tonight. And if you've been following the case of Lynette Hooker missing in the Bahamas, every day brings another huge surprise. And today, two surprises. First and foremost, the issue of what happened and where did something happen to Lynette is unresolved. But it's becoming perhaps more clear. It is starting to feel very much like Brian Hooker and Lynette Hooker actually made it from the Abaco Inn all the way to their yacht Soulmate. That there wasn't some catastrophic. She bounced out the back and I couldn't get her. High waves and terrible weather and wind and oh no, little me. Yeah, it's starting to really feel not only that that didn't happen, but that they made it back to Soulmate. I can't say that for sure, but all of the little Spidey arrows are really pointing that way. And today, another couple of pieces of information that seem to be big blinking Spidey arrows. Let's start with what several witnesses apparently have now come forward and told authorities and that is that they saw flares going off of SoulMate. Brian and Lynette's 46 foot catch flares going off their sailboat anchored out in front of Aunt Pat's Bay off Elbow Key. Flares. The way Brian puts it, he was floating aimlessly with one paddle that he could barely Struggle against the winds and the waves and. Oh, my God, there weren't winds and waves like that. And apparently Lynette went out the back with the dry bag that had the extra key in it and somehow grabbed the lanyard and took that with her. And grabbed the dry bag and took that with her too as she bounced out back. Meanwhile, she's holding the throttle. Why are you letting her drive if the weather's so bad and she barely ever drives? Why are you doing that? I digress. If he's floating, he says, for like, I don't know, better part of an hour. He says sometime around like, nine, I think he's at the north part of. Of Lubbers quarters, which is just a spit away. Then he decides to throw out the anchor and fire off his flare. But the witnesses don't say that that's what they saw. The witnesses say they saw multiple witnesses. They saw flares going off the sailboat. Now, what in the. What do you think happened there? If the witnesses are accurate and a flare was fired off the sailboat, why would that happen? If my mind were taking me in a couple of different directions, might that have been Lynette? Was Lynette in trouble and firing off a flare, asking for help? Is that possible? Look, anything's possible. Was someone shooting the flare at another person on that sailboat? Was Brian firing the flare at her? Was she firing the flare at him and it went out? I don't know the trajectory of what the witnesses saw. Typically, in distress, you fire a flare straight up, and it goes up like a. Like a firework, and it stays lit and illuminated long and visible for miles. And boaters know if you see a flare, someone in trouble, and you gotta go to help. The witnesses who saw the flare. I don't know what they did because I didn't hear any reports of anybody going to help anybody. Did it happen? Maybe, but that's not coming back to me. That's not something that my sources are telling me. Multiple witnesses saw a flare. Why did multiple witnesses, like, go to the source of the flare and help Flare firer? Okay, is it possible that somebody was fighting on board Soulmate and fired a flare? Whether it was Brian firing at Lynette or Lynette firing at Brian because they were in some kind of a conflagration, maybe. And could the trajectory have gone straight instead of straight up? Did the witnesses who saw a flare see a flare skipping along the water or going at a slight elevation or even down from Soulmate into the water? I don't know that. But I hope I do find out soon what the actual trajectory of those flares was because someone might have thought, well, that's not a distress flare. If that flare was going lateral or down, everybody knows the distress flare goes up. So this is curious, but I'm about to show you some video in a moment that suggests there was no flare that went straight up because I did get video, I did get surveillance video from lovers quarters looking straight on at Elbow Key. I'm going to show it to you in a bit. But let me tell you folks, it covers the whole area all the way from Tahiti beach to White Sound Channel. You're going to see it all. And I have scrubbed through it a million times. A couple of brand new friends of mine have scrubbed through it as well with me. They provided the video. I'm just going to give a huge shout out right now to Dean Zomsell and his two daughters, Katy Kelly and Julianne Barenbrook. Those folks, I can't thank you enough. Not only did you give me your surveillance video, your security camera video that points right out across the Sea of Abaco towards where Soulmate was anchored and Elbow Key behind it, but you also zeroed in on it. And Dean's daughters are really talented. I think one of you is in film and the other one, I think you're true crime fans as well. But they zeroed in on it and they've given me really, really as clear as we can get imagery. And it is possible we may be seeing a dinghy heading towards Soulmate. I'll show it to you in a minute. I just want to finish this flare story because from Dean Zamzal's home and looking across Sea of Abaco, you 100% would see a flare in the night sky. And Dean's video is second to second all night long. All the way from when Brian swears up and down he left the abaco inn at 7:30. Coming up white Sound Channel and heading south towards Soulmate. Never made it there because, ah, my wife, ah, and then I floated, ah, nine hours. But it shows the sky, it shows all of it. Like that view across shows everything. And you would have seen a flare going up. So I'm starting to wonder if the witnesses saw a flare going out and maybe that might have been more difficult. I'm also told from my sources that the witnesses saw the flare going off prior to 9pm don't forget, 8 to 9pm is pitch black and real, real dark. Okay, so 8 to 9pm if the flare Went off. It's dark, dark, dark. I just find it surprising that the video I'm going to show you, we. We could not see that. Now could the flare have gone off forward and then been eclipsed by the transom of the boat or broadside of the boat? Again, there's all sorts of permutations and combinations here that may have meant you can't see it from necessarily Dean Zomziel's video, but I still think that you might be able to see those things. So Lindsay and I decided to do something. We took Dean Zomzael's surveillance video at night and we sped it up and we decided to go between 8 o' clock and 9 o' clock because it's dark at 8, right? And that's when you would see a flares in the darkness for the most part. And I don't know what time these witnesses saw the flare. Just I believe it's before 9. So we decided to speed up 8 till 9pm to see if at any point in that hour you could see the flicker of a flare. And we just weren't able to see it. And I know that Katie Kelly and Julianne Baringbrook, Dean's daughters, also did that. So we've had multiple sets of eyes on this and we just haven't been able to catch anything that resembles a flare. And you may want to look at this video a few times, but zero in on the place where I told you Soulmate was right as opposed to way. Originally I looked at it way up north. You know, did a flare go off up near the north end of Lubbers? But he wasn't up there. So it would just be really interesting if there was any kind of flicker even partially obstructed by the hull that might have gone eastward. You know, obstructed by the view of the, of the sailboats. Anyway, it's just something to think about. One thing that's kind of bugging me here is if anybody saw a flare going off, why didn't they respond? Even if it went off kind of sideways, it might have meant somebody's having an, you know, an incident, a medical issue, and they didn't get the flare to go straight up. But if you see a flare, it's the, you know, it's the universal signal. I'm in trouble. Help me out, brah. And to my knowledge, nobody did. That's not to say it didn't happen. It's just to my knowledge, I have not had any reports that anybody did come to the aid or come towards Soulmate, where these witnesses say the flare was fired. And that's a bit distressing. Sorry for the pun, but it is distressing that the distress signal didn't yield any results or at least didn't yield any responses that we know of. Now I have mentioned this before in other episodes, but it's going to make a little bit more sense now. Dean told me that bull sharks regularly patrol his shore, meaning over on Lubbers quarters where Dean lives and where his camera's pointing out, you know, across the Sea of Abaco towards Elbow Key. Bull sharks swim up and down like he doesn't even swim off his dock anymore. He sits there and he'll videotape him going by. So that is an interesting piece of the puzzle. I don't think for a minute that Lynette went overboard anywhere near Dean's side of the Abaco Sea over at Lubbers. But it's just an interesting point of reference because knowing that the bull sharks are there, we also showed you video from April 6, which is the Monday after all of this happened, right? This happened on of April 4th, going into the morning of April 5th. And then she's missing all day April 5th, that's Sunday, Easter Sunday. And then Monday we got this incredible video from a new friend of mine from the Bahamas named Jonathan. And he was out with a fisher, with a captain doing some fishing. And the captain was eagle eyed. And spot this spotted this unbelievable tiger shark swimming ahead of them. And that's just outside of the white sound channel again over on the Elbow Key side. So now you know, there's tiger sharks swimming at least right around the area of that western shore of Elbow Key on that day on the April 6, the Monday. And then also the bull shark activity on the eastern shore of Lubbers where Dean Zomzal's house is. And the bull shark activity is pretty, pretty regular there as well. Just something more just to keep in mind if everyone's trying to figure out what happened, what were the circumstances, what was the environment. I also just want to tell you something personal about the work that Lindsay and I have been doing. We've been getting a lot of exclusive videos and photographs that we've been putting on the podcast. But before I do that, and when I get exclusive information as well, before I do that, I share it with Lynette's family members. I share it with her daughter Carly, and I share it with her mom, Darlene and Carly's boyfriend Steve, because I just feel like they should see these things first before the rest of us all do. And so while I like to say exclusive video, I actually have let it out already to three people. And I've also at times worked with Blaine Stevenson, who is a mariner, who's a liveaboard who knows so much about yachting and about boats and keelboats and mariner's life and tides and you name it, that I often run things by him first so that I can get a better understanding. So these are the people that I have been, you know, obviously sharing with and working with prior to coming to air with you and sharing these things with you. So Lynette's family has seen these videos already and they've been, you know, frustrated by them as well. And again, I'm going to show you everything really in depth in just a moment. But let's just like finish with the flare story because Brian swears up and down that he threw his anchor off of the north end of Lubbers. Don't know why he would do it then. He already floated like a mile, you idiot. Like, come on. And then fired off his flare Charlie's angel style.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
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.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Hey, everyone, check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Oh, no. We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Anyways, get a quote@libertymutual.com or with your local agent.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Liberty Liberty. Liberty Liberty.
Safeway/Albertsons Advertiser
This podcast is sponsored by Talkspace. May is mental health awareness month, and Talkspace, the leading virtual therapy provider, is sharing the message. That connection is crucial because. Because good relationships are an essential and sometimes overlooked component of mental well being. If your relationships could use some strengthening, a licensed therapist from Talkspace can help. Therapy can help you communicate better with loved ones, repair conflicts, and understand how to address loneliness and build community. It's easy to sign up. Just go to talkspace.com and you'll be paired with a therapist within two days. You'll meet with your therapist online on your schedule. Plus, Talkspace is in network with most major insurers and most insured members. Have a $0 copay and make personal connections a priority. And start today. If you're not covered by Insurance, get $80 off your first month with Talkspace when you go to talkspace.com and enter promo code SPACE80. That's S, P, A, C, E, 80. To match with a licensed therapist today, go to talkspace.com and Enter promo code SPACE80.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
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.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Hey, everyone, check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Oh, no. We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league.
Liberty Mutual Spokesperson
Anyways, get a'@libertymutual.com or with your local agent.
Liberty Mutual Agent
Liberty, Liberty. Liberty. Liberty. Why there again, you're a U.S. marine fella. You are better trained than I in this kind of emergency rescue. And, you know, marine situations that go sideways. Like, you're way better at this than I am. And I'm way ahead of you on so much of this. I had a really interesting email from a viewer who said anybody who's ever been in sort of the lived the boater's life or done a live aboard situation like this emailer had, they know what to do in an emergency. Because your whole world is kind of living troubleshooting emergencies, right? You're always sort of thinking ahead, like, what if this happens? What am I going to do? What if that happens? What would I do? If this zigs, Will I zag? If that zags, am I going to zig? And so all the things that Brian said he didn't think of, like, well, I didn't think of throwing the anchor down. Really? Really? You just didn't. You just didn't. Okay, so you didn't. All right, well, it's right at your feet, for sake. I just didn't think about maybe putting one of the life vests on myself and grabbing the second one. Because there's two in your dinghy, fella. And jumping out overboard and maybe just tying the dinghy to my hand or my leg and swimming towards her. Yeah. You didn't think any of those things? Nothing? Not one. You didn't think of firing off the flare right there, you know, right at the emergency situation. You just waited until you floated like an hour away and threw your anchor down. And I just couldn't. I couldn't. I tried, I paddled. I couldn't make it to the north end. I couldn't make it to the north end of lepers. And then I was off to Marsh Harbor. Nine hours. It's all horseshit. Y' all. It's all horseshit. It's not just me saying that. It's every single person I've spoken to, locals, mariners alike, boaters, people who've been there, people who've vacationed there, people who live there, people who do fire and rescue there. I've spoken to experts in actual tide patterns and wind patterns, mariners who've actually done the plotting and said this wouldn't have happened. So it's horseshit. And this whole business about throwing your anchor down and firing your flare at the north end of Lers and then what'd you do? Just pick up, pick up your anchor and then let yourself float to Marsh Harbor? Why didn't you just stay anchored? What's up with that? Something else. This guy who emailed me said that was fascinating and I didn't know this and so thank you. Off the north tip of Lubbers Quarters, it's apparently super duper shallow, big old reef. Like big. Meaning if you're clipping the north end of Lubbers and going by and trying to paddle in, you could just get out and stand just a couple feet, just get on out and walk your raft into levers. How far off the north tip were you there, Brian? In any case, again, just so many, so many ways to refute his story. Now let's talk about the video. Because if Brian, Brian's story is true, everybody would have seen from Elbow Key. Everybody would have seen, you know, this, this distress signal going up high at Levers. Instead they're saying they saw a flare on his sailboat before 9 o'. Clock. Now what you doing on your sailboat before 9:00'? Clock? If you're on it, no one's on your sailboat before 9 o'. Clock. Y' all never made it from Abaco in. Y' all had that terrible, terrible. She bounced out the back moment halfway towards your boat, thousand meters away from your boat, and then you floated away. So how did flares go off from your boat just before 9pm? Prior to 9pm I shouldn't say just before, prior to 9pm I'm still trying to nail down the exact time. You gotta, you gotta be patient with me. I'm a one man show. I'm a two man show. Lindsay and me. So let's go to Dean Zomzel's video because there's a few things I want you to know about this video. And Dean, I love you, man. You could not have been more helpful sending me this, this incredible video from your beautiful home on Lubbers Quarters. Dean's house faces the action. He faces the ass end of Soulmate and looks right into Elbow Key. It's about a mile or so across. I might be off, but, you know, it's a fair ways. It's fair ways enough to pixelate a lot of the action closer to Elbow Key. But what Dean and his two daughters, Katie and Julianne, were able to show me was that they can make out what appears to be Soulmate, a keelboat. Like, you know, you see those sailboats, the people live aboard, and they've got cabins down below, and they hang the laundry off the back, and they've got, you know, a dinghy and all the rest. That's a keel boat. It's got a big old keel that goes underwater to keep it from tipping over like that all the time. There's also a catamaran. So a keel boat is a mono hull. It has one hull. A catamaran has two hulls. It's got two hulls, and it's connected in the middle. Lots of space, too, if you ever go. If you ever decide to go sailing. I love the Cat. I mean, I like both. I like a mono hull and I like the dual hull. I love the catamaran. So much space. And it's fun to go out in the net in the front and all the rest. But there's a catamaran who park just to. On. If you're looking at the image, park to the left of what appears to be Soulmate, which would be just a little bit north of Soulmate. Soulmate is a little bit south of the catamaran. And Dean's video was kind of looking into the. The ass end, which we like to call the transom. The transoms of both of those boats. That tells you a big thing right there. A huge clue, tells you the wind direction. Because as you know, if you throw an anchor down off the bow of a boat, you're going to swing on the fulcrum, right? You're going to. You're going to swing around according to the wind. Maybe you'll swing this way when the wind shifts this way, and maybe you'll swing this way when the wind shifts, right? It's like you. You can tell, you know, just the way a wind would blow a boat if it's just hanging on an anchor, right on an anchor chain. And the fact that Dean's video sees the ass end of these boats, sees their transoms, means that the wind was coming straight towards Dean's home, which would be southwest. Now, if that's the way the wind was blowing. How on earth did Brian's little dinghy blow northwest instead of south west? Think about it. The wind, you can see it minute by minute from Dean's security video. The wind is coming at him and kind of down the island south. How'd you miss the north end of lepers? How'd you skip past the north end of lovers and end up all the way over at Marsh Harbor? That doesn't really make sense. That's not the way the wind was howling, my friend. You said there were two to three foot seas and the wind was howling. Would have blown you right into lubbers. Would have blown you right into Dean's house. Actually, probably somewhere around there because Dean's neighbor got the paddle. Well, at least a paddle blew up on the shore just down south from, from Dean's house. Still not 100% sure if it's the paddle, but a paddle. And they took it to the, to the police. They. They turned it over to the folks, to the authority. So that's just a huge clue right there from, from Zomzal's video. But let's, let's zero in to what I think Katie and Julianne were onto something here. It is not easy. I have already reached out to Jake Green, who does so much analysis for me when I was on News Nation, he would always do video analysis. He's. He's just great at this. His whole world is tech and he's done a little bit of enhancement on this. But effectively he said, ash, those boats only have a handful of pixels each, and so enhancement is really, really hard. But you can get an idea of masses. And TMZ had video of Soulmate parked at Aunt Pat's Bay. And you can see the other boats. You can see the relativity of other boats around them. So it's not too, too hard to sort of surmise which one's the big dual hull, the catamaran, the two hull giant. It's got the big wide back, back end. And which one's the mono hull that's got the skinnier transom. Right. So what we've all done is we have tried to squint best we can, second by second, split second by split second to see if we can spot a dinghy. You're not going to spot the action of the dinghy. If Brian's story is true, going over in between, you know, a thousand yards north of where Soulmates anchored, you're not going to see that happen. But is there any way to spot the dinghy? Getting close to Soulmate. And we think we can see, like, a black dot, which might be Brian and Lynette in their dinghy making it back to Soulmate. And it happens at about 7:44 Eastern Time. Well, that's the time that he was saying Lynette went out. Right. Somewhere between 7:44,750, somewhere around there up. She bounced out. We were a thousand yards away from our boat. She bounced out. And it's hard to tell. But thank you to Katie and Julianne for enhancing. Best you can. If you look, it's almost perceptible to see a little black dot sort of crossing behind the big, wide transom, heading left to right on your screen, and crossing over the big, wide transom of the catamaran, the big dual hull, and heading southward towards that mono hull. Soulmate. I can't be 100% sure of that, but rest assured, friends, not only do I share things with family members before you see them, but I also do share this kind of work product with the. With the authorities, with the appropriate authorities. And I know that cgis, the Coast Guard Investigative Services, they've got way more tools in their trunk than I do. They also have access to the FBI lab in Quantico for enhancements. So I only can imagine that they're doing everything they can with that video, if there's anything that can be done with this video. But just so you know, I don't keep this stuff to myself. While I'm fascinated by it, I am also fiercely committed to justice for Lynette. And if. If that means turning over my work product, then so be it, you know, Anyway, I would be fascinated to see if there's any kind of enhancement tools out there that can do a better job than we've been able to. I'm not too sure. But listen, I'm still on the hunt. There are other people out there that have video, and I am particularly interested in video from Elbow Key, video from Aunt Pat's Bay, video from any home along the western shore of Elbow Key that follows the shoreline from White Sound Channel, where Brian says he swore he was coming from the Abaco Inn, skipping along in their dinghy to head towards the safety of their liveaboard yacht. There are homes. There are. There are rental places, There are homes, and there are beautiful spots along there. And I wouldn't doubt that there aren't security cameras, but also enjoyment cameras, because not everybody lives there. Some people rent them out and they come there some, you know, parts of the year. But when they're back stateside or wherever side, wherever they live, they can actually see the beautiful sights of the Sea of Abaco and all the boats bobbing at Anchorage out in front of their docks or boathouses or whatever they might have on the shoreline. So I am pretty sure that there have to be a lot of places along that Elbow Key shoreline that have security video or just surveillance video or just enjoyment video, nest cams, whatever. It is just like Dean Zomzyl has. Because, you know, sometimes you want to watch your dock, too, to make sure the dock is okay or maybe there's a hurricane coming and you want to make sure, you want to see, you know, what's coming and what's happening. In this day and age, it would be hard to believe that loads and loads of folks don't have some kind of camera pointing right towards Soulmate. So basically the opposite of Dean Zomzaal's video. These would be folks on the other shore pointing towards Dean. The difference is, is that Soulmate was parked just a couple hundred yards, maybe 150 yards or so offshore from the west shore of Elbow Key. And, you know, sound carries on water and it's nice and calm as you tuck in to that leeward side of Elbow Key. It's why people anchor there. It's why it's called an anchorage. It's why it's a popular anchorage, is because it's calm. You don't get blown off your hook in the middle of the night and end up on the, you know, on a reef somewhere or up on the coral or on the land or on bottom or something, you know. So a big appeal to you if you. If you know someone who has homes along that stretch all the way from Tahiti beach to White Sound Channel, all along that shore, that western shore of Elbow Key, if you know somebody, if you yourself have a rental home there, if you live there, if you have a friend or a family member or somebody who's been there, all of the above. Reach out to me. Drop dead serious infomail.com Drop dead serious info gmail.com we would really like to be able to get to the bottom of this and find out if that dinghy, if Brian and Lynette's dinghy made it back to Soulmate, because if it did, game over. Like, game over. Because none of Brian's story can ever possibly make sense. There are lots of other ways, and we've talked about it. We've talked about the electronics, We've talked about the handshakes. We've talked about Whatever digital devices may have reconnected to Soulmate if Brian and Lynette made it back to soulmate that evening. And I'm gonna just lay it on the line here, folks. I'm pretty sure they did because that whole bullshit story didn't happen. So something else happened. Something else made Lynette disappear. What was it? Brian's got a history being pretty rough with people. He was rough with his daughter. He went to court over it. He was adjudicated and acquitted by a jury. But the witnesses all said he choked out his 12 year old daughter. Lynette's mom, Darlene has said he choked out Darlene multiple times. We've got pictures of. Of Lynette with bruises all over her back. She wrote contemporaneously to her friend Rachel. Oh God, these hurt. My back is killing me. From where I was pinned against the, you know, the, the, the, the benches in the, in the cockpit of the, of the sailboat. Apparently she took the photos to remind herself so that she wouldn't go back to him. But she did. Darlene said that her daughter would always leave him. Come to her in Florida, say this is it. Not, not going back. But then eventually, for whatever reason, would go back. Darlene even consulted a battered woman's shelter and how to deal with her daughter. What do I do? What do I do? Darlene went to a battered women's shelter to ask for advice. What does that tell you? Tells you there's a pretty good chance that Brian was taking the boots to Lynette and choking her out. These are the allegations, right? Reports that it's happened before. Arrests, domestic violence issues between them, the court case with his 12 year old. Right. So maybe something happened aboard. And I have told you before that it takes about three hours before a body will start giving off the kinds of decomposition clues that a cadaver dog can pick up. So if something happened aboard, Brian's got three hours before a cadaver dog's ever going to pick up. Anything happen on that boat? Same with the dinghy. Right? So whatever may have happened on board. Three hours to clean up. No trace for that cadaver dog. And the cadaver dog was there. And when you choke someone out, there's no blood. So that's also something that cadaver dog doesn't pick up. Three hours. What can you do? Probably plenty, because lubbers is real close. You know, lovers is just like a mile away. So I got my eyes on that. I got my eyes on lovers quarters. And there's lots of places there after Hurricane Dorian really, you know, took the boots to that whole area of the Bahamas that just hasn't really come back yet. And it's very dark and. And kind of great to sneak around, get rid of a body, because that body's not in the Sea of Abaco. She's not floating. She didn't bounce out. And suddenly this fantastic swimmer who's in like 5ft of water and is a hundred yards from shore just can't survive that. The sea was not angry, my friends. The sea was not angry. We already know it. We've seen the video. So was that their dinghy going across the transom of the catamaran? Because that's a nice, big, wide, white sort of area in the very pixelated video that there's this little black dot that appears to maybe go by heading south right towards the catamaran's neighbor, which is soulmate. Was that them? Maybe someone, you know has the video. Again, drop dead serious. Infomail.com or if you don't want to give it to me, I get it. Totally understand. At the very least, would you please send it to the Coast Guard Investigative services. They have this fantastic app. It's anonymous. CGIS tips. Just go to the app store, you'll see it. Anonymous. You can, you can get a hold of them. That way you can give them your video, you can tell them what you know. And by the way, I have seen these guys at work over there. I showed you the video of them. They were over there with their dog and they were all over the north tip of Lubbers, because that's what Brian originally was suggesting. There's a lot more, I think, that can and I think will be done. But these guys solve crimes. You may think Coast Guard. Well, what do they have to do? And a lot of people have been talking about the FBI. No, Coast Guard Investigative Services. They are bad ass, bad to the bone. They do this kind of thing. They're crafty and clever, so don't underestimate them. But the other thing I was wondering about is what color were the flares? When the witnesses. Plural, again, multiple. When they witnessed flares, what color were they red? Were they yellow? Now I have flares in my boat. I've had them for decades. And yes, I do swap them out for you Mariners out there. I know that they expire and all the rest and I'm not really good at keeping them up to date, but I do have safety kits on board my boat. I have multiple boats because I live on an island and if one boat goes Down. You're not going anywhere. And we all of us have jobs, and so we all have to be at different places at all times. So I have multiple boats, and every one of them has a security kit and they all have flares, but I've never had to fire one off. So I don't know what color it is. My assumption is it's red, I think, and I would love the comments, please to tell me. I think that the international sign of distress is a red flare. But I do know there are yellow flares, and I think there are also, correct me if I'm wrong, green flares. I'm out of my league here. But. But I would be very curious to find out what the witnesses saw in terms of the color of the flare. And did witnesses see different colors? Because that's. I mean, listen, every witness, there are so many witness accounts that people are certain of what they saw, and it's not true. Witness accounts are really touchy science these days. I mean, we used to think they were the end all, be all. We don't anymore. But it would be curious to find out how many of the witnesses saw the same thing. Same trajectory, same colors, same everything. I want to bring up an issue of Lynette's watch because one of our episodes was a big deal. Like, a really big deal, forensically speaking, because Lynette is seen taking a selfie at the Abaco Inn at 5:44pm that day. What we zoomed in on was this very, very light band on her left wrist. Sure looked a lot like her powder pink apple watch band. And some of you are really, really good sleuths. And you zeroed in on a photograph of Lynette sitting with Carly's cat on her lap. And you notice that Lynette's got her powder pink apple watch on her right wrist. And on her left wrist is a tan line. Is it possible we could have been seeing a tan line in that photograph at the Abaco Inn pool? Very, very good question. But I will put this to you. The photograph is from quite a long way away, and it is not very clear. It's blurry at best. But I think you would be hard pressed to see that tan line from that distance and the minimal pixelation. But the rigidity of her right hand in this picture with the cat, very bright. That powder pink watch is very, very bright and clear. The lines are clear. I mean, the brightness is as bright as that blanket. But the tan line is really kind of harder to make out. It's not as clear. The lines aren't as solid. The whiteness of her skin is not as bright as that powder pink apple watch. And so in order to even see a little bit of what appears to be the apple watch, I think it's got to be solid powder pink with rigid lines and wide. I really don't think that tan line would have picked up like that from that far away in that picture. But I think it's very good sleuthing on your part. These are my opinions only. You can certainly have your own. I do want to add something to the watch story because we found another picture of Lynette. It's actually a video shot on board in 2023. And I guess Brian and Lynette had this solar baking tube and they make bread and paninis and all sorts of things in this little skinny solar baking tube. And in one video that's entitled Pigs in a Blanket, you can see Lynette's ring finger. So you know it's her left hand, unless she switched her ring over into her right hand, and I doubt it. And it's not a flipped video. I'm pretty sure this is her left hand. And she is sporting a green band and an apple watch. Don't know what to make of it. It's three years ago, but there is a green band and what appears to be an apple watch on her wrist. Did she swap out the band for the pink one? Did she get new apple watch altogether three years ago? Don't know. Just interesting to note that there was a green band at one point. But I do know this. The watch that's in the custody of the police is a powder pink apple watch. Powder pink band apple watch. I believe it's a 2021 model as well. So that's just. Just an. Again, these are so many pieces to the puzzle. And if you are a puzzle doer like me, I don't do it that often, but certainly during COVID I did them a lot. Sometimes these pieces just stay out in the periphery for a long time until finally you get an idea of where they fit. But sometimes it just takes time and you got to get the pieces that are adjacent to it in order for that piece to make sense. So there's a lot of those in this story as well. And then there's this. You can see in that selfie video of Lynette that she is wearing a bright blue headscarf, right? And this was something she did a lot. Headband scarves. In fact, her daughter Carly wanted some of those scarves when she went aboard Soulmate to get some special treasures of her mom. She got some of her mom's headscarves. And I did ask her if the bright blue headscarf that Lynette is seen photographed in at the pool might have been on board. Carly didn't see it. She didn't take it with her in any case. But she didn't see everything on board. She didn't see the master cabin all the way through. She didn't see the the bathroom. So it's entirely possible that she might have missed it. Again, this is with the supposition that maybe Lynette made it back to the boat. Maybe Lynette went to the bathroom and decided to shower off after a day out in the salty air and the salty sea. And maybe she took the blue head scarf off and left it in the bathroom. Who knows? But that blue head scarf, someone pointed out to us that they recognize the pattern on it and that it is a popular pattern scarf that is sold at a lot of stores in Key West. And it says on it Conch Republic. I remember a flag at some point that I think I saw flying off of one of the stays. Those are those metal wires that come from the top of the mast all the way down over the spreaders, which are the. This is a lot of Mariners lingo, but they're the horizontal pieces that keep those stays out to the edge of the boat. I think I remember seeing one of those Conch Republic flags on board Soulmate at one point. I don't know if it was long ago or recently, but Conch Republic is certainly kind of a fun, you know, conch shells, you can whistle through them and all the rest and conch salad and conch seafood and all the rest. Conch Republic is sort of a popular express and T shirt and flag that you see in the islands a lot. And I saw a lot of them in Bahamas as well. So it wouldn't be surprising if she had a Conc Republic blue scarf. So there you have it. There seems to be no shortage of information that floods in every single day on this and I am so, so appreciative. For those of you who have reached out to drop dead serious infomail.com and given us your thoughts, your ideas, some of your emails are so fantast. And also, you know, Dean Zomzal, thank you so much for reaching out and your daughters for doing the work that you did that made all the difference. We were able to see a lot. We were able to see a lot in those videos and Maybe, just maybe, the Coast Guard is going to be able to enhance them even more. I'm still working on enhancements and maybe I can come back to you in a couple more days. It's not a quick and easy thing, but. And if you want to do enhancements and you have a better solution, by all means, reach out to us@dropdeadseriousinfomail.com and like I said, can't stress enough how important it is if anybody knows anybody over in the Bahamas or if you're there yourself, an elbow key and you might have a line in on somebody who might have cameras pointing out towards Aunt Pat's Bay's anchorage. All the boats that just hang out there in the anchorage, there you could have the smoking gun. You could have such an incredible piece of information right there at your hands. And I would so appreciate it if you took a look. Everything from 7 o' clock on April 4, Saturday, April 4, it was the night before Easter. Easy to remember 7 o' clock the night before Easter, all the way through to just say 9:30. Because you might see that dinghy and you might see a flare and you might see something even more nefarious. I'm just suggesting it's a possibility because everything else Brian has given us is a load of caca. None of it makes sense. Thank you everyone for watching. Thank you for listening. I so appreciate you. Don't forget to subscribe. And by the way, members, thank you for your amazing questions over the weekend. It was really great connecting with you all. I loved your questions. You are so on top of this story. I love it. So if you haven't joined our membership, hit join down below because I do all these like special exclusive things for the members only. And the the Q A session went for like an hour and 20 minutes. I think my mom wandered in behind. It's like, mom, you're on video. But it was really great and I would love it if you would if you join up and and take part in our next Ask Me Anything. They're really fun and sometimes there's wine. Most times there's something. Often there's root beer. But I think everybody else has wine. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. Don't forget, truth isn't just serious, it's drop dead seriously.
Episode: Did Husband Shoot off Flares from Sailboat? New Video & Witnesses | Lynette Hooker Missing
Date: April 29, 2026
In this episode, Ashleigh Banfield dives deep into the latest developments in the baffling disappearance of Lynette Hooker in the Bahamas. With new witness statements, fresh analysis of key video surveillance, and forensic details about the night Lynette vanished, Banfield methodically challenges the official narrative provided by Lynette’s husband, Brian, blending her irreverent, unfiltered style with true-crime rigor.
Brian Hooker’s Story: Claims Lynette fell off their dinghy in bad weather on the way to their yacht, Soulmate, and that he struggled for hours before firing a distress flare from his drifting dinghy.
Skepticism: Banfield expresses growing doubt; new evidence suggests both Brian and Lynette might have made it back to Soulmate, contradicting Brian's timeline and scenario.
“It is starting to feel very much like Brian Hooker and Lynette Hooker actually made it from the Abaco Inn all the way to their yacht Soulmate... all of the little Spidey arrows are really pointing that way.” (01:21)
Multiple Witnesses: Now report seeing flares coming from Soulmate, anchored off Aunt Pat’s Bay, before 9pm.
Flare Trajectory: Notably, Banfield questions whether the flares went straight up (distress) or laterally—raising the possibility of a struggle or signaling between Lynette and Brian.
Lack of Response: She’s baffled no one appears to have responded to the flares, considering their universal distress meaning.
"If the witnesses are accurate and a flare was fired off the sailboat, why would that happen?... Might that have been Lynette? Was Lynette in trouble and firing off a flare, asking for help?" (02:55)
"If you see a flare, it’s the universal signal: I’m in trouble. Help me out, brah. And to my knowledge, nobody did.” (12:19)
Dean Zomzel’s Video: Banfield received nighttime surveillance footage from Dean Zomzel’s home on Lubbers Quarters, pointed at Soulmate’s anchorage.
No Visible Flares: Despite intense review (with help from Dean’s daughters and tech experts), no classic “flares in the night sky” are visible between 8–9pm.
Possible Dinghy Sighting: Careful enhancement reveals a possible black dot (dinghy) moving toward Soulmate around 7:44pm, undermining Brian’s claim that Lynette never returned to the yacht.
“You would have seen a flare going up… We just haven’t been able to catch anything that resembles a flare.” (11:09)
“We think we can see, like, a black dot, which might be Brian and Lynette in their dinghy making it back to Soulmate. And it happens at about 7:44 Eastern time.” (29:28)
Shark Activity: Both bull and tiger sharks are noted in the area, complicating overboard scenarios, but Banfield finds it unlikely Lynette ended up there.
Cadaver Dog Limitations: Banfield shares that post-mortem clues required for detection by dogs take about three hours to develop, possibly allowing time to clean up evidence if foul play occurred.
“If something happened aboard, Brian’s got three hours before a cadaver dog’s ever going to pick up anything… And when you choke someone out, there’s no blood.” (41:14)
Mariner Skepticism: Banfield and multiple boater listeners challenge Brian’s actions and timeline—questioning decisions not to anchor, don life vests, or swim.
Wind Direction & Location Evidence: Surveillance footage contradicts Brian’s alleged drift path; winds would have blown him to Lubbers Quarters, not away from it.
“You said there were two to three-foot seas and the wind was howling. Would have blown you right into Lubbers… That doesn’t really make sense.” (29:14)
Patterns of Abuse: Banfield shares allegations of prior violence by Brian toward Lynette and his daughter, including court documents and photos of injuries, suggesting possible motive and pattern.
Lynette’s Attempts to Leave: Lynette’s mother and daughter confirm recurring attempts to leave Brian and subsequent returns, with evidence that Darlene (her mother) consulted battered women’s shelters.
“There’s a pretty good chance that Brian was taking the boots to Lynette and choking her out. These are the allegations, right? Reports that it’s happened before.” (43:50)
Apple Watch: Photo analysis suggests Lynette wore a powder-pink Apple Watch up to the day of disappearance. Banfield and listeners discuss possible tan lines and band swaps; police have the pink-banded Apple Watch in evidence.
Blue Headscarf: Lynette was seen wearing a “Conch Republic” blue headscarf; daughter Carly did not see it when recovering items from the boat, but didn’t search every area.
“The watch that’s in the custody of the police is a powder pink Apple Watch… just so many pieces to the puzzle.” (54:00)
Urgent Request: Banfield urges anyone with surveillance or Nest Cam footage of Soulmate’s anchorage from Elbow Key—especially between 7:00 and 9:30pm on April 4—to contact her or the Coast Guard Investigative Services (CGIS Tips app).
“You could have the smoking gun. You could have such an incredible piece of information right there at your hands... Everything from 7 o’clock on April 4… through to just say 9:30.” (57:51)
Doubt about Brian’s Story:
“It’s all horseshit, y’all. It’s all horseshit. It’s not just me saying that, it’s every single person I’ve spoken to… mariners who’ve actually done the plotting and said this wouldn’t have happened.” (19:43)
On Flares as a Universal Signal:
“If you see a flare, it’s the universal signal: I’m in trouble. Help me out, brah. And to my knowledge, nobody did. That’s a bit distressing. Sorry for the pun...” (12:19)
Forensic Details:
“If something happened aboard, Brian’s got three hours before a cadaver dog’s ever going to pick up anything… when you choke someone out, there’s no blood.” (41:14)
Appeal to the Audience:
“If you know someone who has homes along that stretch… you could have the smoking gun… reach out to me… or, at the very least, would you please send it to the Coast Guard Investigative Services.” (55:30)
This episode delivers a pointed, meticulously skeptical challenge to the official narrative of Lynette Hooker’s disappearance. Through new witness accounts, collaborative video forensics, and cross-examination of boating logic, Ashleigh Banfield suggests the distress flare origin and timeline seriously undermine Brian’s story. The concluding call to action—asking locals and visitors for any home video evidence—shows Banfield’s commitment to crowdsourced investigative journalism and real justice for Lynette Hooker.