[House Hearing, 109 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
INTERNATIONAL MARITIME SECURITY II: LAW ENFORCEMENT, PASSENGER SECURITY
AND INCIDENT INVESTIGATION ON CRUISE SHIPS
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,
EMERGING THREATS, AND INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
of the
COMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 7, 2006
__________
Serial No. 109-154
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
index.html
http://www.house.gov/reform
______
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COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM
TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
DAN BURTON, Indiana TOM LANTOS, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York
JOHN L. MICA, Florida PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania
GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
CHRIS CANNON, Utah WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee DIANE E. WATSON, California
CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
DARRELL E. ISSA, California LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
JON C. PORTER, Nevada C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
KENNY MARCHANT, Texas BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina Columbia
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania ------
VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio (Independent)
------ ------
David Marin, Staff Director
Teresa Austin, Chief Clerk
Phil Barnett, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel
Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats, and International
Relations
CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut, Chairman
KENNY MARCHANT, Texas DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
DAN BURTON, Indiana TOM LANTOS, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts
JON C. PORTER, Nevada BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania
Ex Officio
TOM DAVIS, Virginia HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
Lawrence J. Halloran, Staff Director and Counsel
R. Nicholas Palarino, Senior Policy Analyst
Robert A. Briggs, Clerk
Andrew Su, Minority Professional Staff Member
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on March 7, 2006.................................... 1
Statement of:
Carver, Kendall, Phoenix, AZ; Son Michael Pham, Bellevue, WA;
Deborah Shaffer, Tucson, AZ; Janet Kelly, Cottonwood, AZ;
Ira Leonard, Hamden, CT; and Brian Mulvaney, Miami, FL..... 30
Carver, Kendall.......................................... 30
Kelly, Janet............................................. 63
Leonard, Ira............................................. 69
Mulvaney, Brian.......................................... 117
Pham, Son Michael........................................ 49
Shaffer, Deborah......................................... 56
Mandigo, Charley, director, Fleet Security, Holland America
Line; and Captain William S. Wright, senior vice president,
Marine Operations, Royal Caribbean International,
accompanied by James Fox, Northeastern University, the
Lipman Family Professor of Criminal Justice................ 218
Mandigo, Charley......................................... 218
Wright, Captain William S................................ 224
Rivkind, Brett, Rivkind Pedraza & Margulies, P.A.; Ronald J.
Gorsline, owner, Secure Ocean Service, LLC; and Lawrence W.
Kaye, senior partner, Kaye, Rose & Partners, LLP........... 148
Gorsline, Ronald J....................................... 162
Kaye, Lawrence W......................................... 180
Rivkind, Brett........................................... 148
Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:
Carver, Kendall, Phoenix, AZ, prepared statement of.......... 34
Fox, James, Northeastern University, the Lipman Family
Professor of Criminal Justice, information concerning crime
aboard cruise ships........................................ 251
Gorsline, Ronald J., owner, Secure Ocean Service, LLC,
prepared statement of...................................... 166
Hastings, Hon. Alcee, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Florida, prepared statement of.................... 27
Kaye, Lawrence W., senior partner, Kaye, Rose & Partners, LLP
, prepared statement of.................................... 183
Kelly, Janet, Cottonwood, AZ, prepared statement of.......... 66
Kucinich, Hon. Dennis J., a Representative in Congress from
the State of Ohio:
Information concerning Royal Caribbean Cruises........... 244
Prepared statement of.................................... 8
Leonard, Ira, Hamden, CT, prepared statement of.............. 72
Mulvaney, Brian, Miami, FL:
Photograph............................................... 146
Prepared statement of.................................... 119
Pham, Son Michael, Bellevue, WA, prepared statement of....... 52
Rivkind, Brett, Rivkind Pedraza & Margulies, P.A............. 151
Shaffer, Deborah, Tucson, AZ, prepared statement of.......... 59
Shays, Hon. Christopher, a Representative in Congress from
the State of Connecticut:
Prepared statement of.................................... 3
Prepared statement of Terry L. Dale...................... 16
Responses to questions................................... 220
Wright, Captain William S., senior vice president, Marine
Operations, Royal Caribbean International, prepared
statement of............................................... 227
INTERNATIONAL MARITIME SECURITY II: LAW ENFORCEMENT, PASSENGER SECURITY
AND INCIDENT INVESTIGATION ON CRUISE SHIPS
----------
TUESDAY, MARCH 7, 2006
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging
Threats, and International Relations,
Committee on Government Reform,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:07 p.m., in
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher
Shays (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Shays, Davis, Duncan, Mica,
Kucinich, Van Hollen, Ruppersberger, and Lynch.
Staff present: Lawrence Halloran, staff director and
counsel; R. Nicholas Palarino, senior policy analyst; Robert A.
Briggs, analyst; Andrew Su, minority professional staff member;
and Jean Gosa, minority assistant clerk.
Mr. Shays. Good afternoon. A quorum being present, the
Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats, and
International Relations hearing entitled, ``International
Maritime Security II: Law Enforcement, Passenger Security and
Incident Investigation on Cruise Ships'' is called to order.
Today, we continue our examination of the intricate web of
treaties, laws, regulations, and industrial practices intended
to protect lives, rights, and property in the maritime realm.
As new threats against American citizens and American interests
emerge in the post-September 11th era, we ask how effectively
that legal umbrella protects the lives, rights, and property of
those traveling in international waters.
As we will hear in testimony today, the answer too often
depends upon an unpredictable combination of facts,
circumstance, and happenstance that may or may not mean the
protections of U.S. laws are available to those in peril on the
sea. The fate of those gone missing or the rights of those
against whom a crime has been committed may be determined by
the nationality of those involved, the ship's national
registry, or its exact location at the time of the incident.
Good luck to passengers wishing to understand their rights
at sea. Even attorneys find it difficult to navigate the
complex jurisdictional boundaries, statutory definitions,
treaty provisions, maritime traditions, and fine-print
liability disclaimers. Even when the law is clear, the
effective reach of U.S. authority depends on the willingness
and ability of cruise ship operators to make security a visible
priority, recognize and report incidents, preserve evidence,
and conduct thorough onboard investigations.
Once cast adrift from the familiar moorings of U.S. laws
and law enforcement, security personnel abroad these floating
resorts become the only law to which passengers can look for
help and protection. Are they trained and equipped to provide
the security passengers have a right to expect? For those
waiting back on shore, any effort to determine what has
happened to a friend or relative can also face daunting legal
and corporate hurdles. A business built on the premise of
pleasure-filled conveyance has little incentive to inform third
parties when the trip goes wrong. Time, distance, and legal
uncertainties work to keep worried survivors at arm's length.
Some portray it as a stiff arm at bat, extended in the interest
of denying, delaying, or discounting information about the
inherent risks of sea travel.
Unlike shore-bound contracts for accommodation, the pact
between cruise lines and their passengers should be read to
include a duty to preserve evidence and provide information
about the fate of those, however few, who have come to harm in
isolated, unforgiving ocean environs.
After our previous hearing on these issues, the
subcommittee requested information on reports of crimes and
missing persons from cruise ship operators. The information
received so far suggests cruise travel may be statistically
safe in terms of the number of serious incidents reported by
the total number of passengers carried in any given year. But
we look to our witnesses to put those numbers in context so the
subcommittee and the traveling public can make informed
judgments about the relative security of an ocean voyage.
Today, we will hear from three panels of witnesses: cruise
passengers and family members, maritime security experts, and
cruise line operators. Welcome to all our witnesses. We look
forward to their testimony.
At this time the Chair would want to note that the chairman
of the full committee is in attendance, and we will call on him
after we call on the ranking member, Mr. Kucinich.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Christopher Shays follows:]
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Mr. Kucinich. I want to thank the chairman.
Out of respect for the Chair being here, I would be happy
to yield to the Chair of the full committee.
Chairman Tom Davis. I will just be brief. Mr. Shays, thank
you.
I want to thank Mr. Shays for holding this hearing. It is a
continuation of the important focus on the security of American
citizens wherever they are in the world.
This hearing is significant because cruises are an ever
more popular vacation choice for American families, and
ensuring traveler safety should be a priority for all of us.
I am not an expert on the industry. I know there have been
some very high-profile incidents aboard cruise ships in recent
months, and I think if there is reason to believe safety and
security are being shortchanged, we need to understand that. We
also need to understand the notification procedures, which is
one of the shortcomings we have. In spite of some of the good
news--and some of the good news is that this industry is built
on customer service. I have seen statistics showing that in
2005 approximately 55 percent of all passengers were repeat
guests. So a lot of people appear satisfied with their
experience as well.
Now, this subcommittee has spent a lot of hours looking
into the industry, and I want to commend Chairman Shays and his
staff for these efforts. I think that sunshine is the best
disinfectant. What has emerged, we get a picture of an industry
that is conscious of its public images, its understanding that
customer service is its lifeblood. They are grasping the need
to cooperate with a large number of U.S. Government agencies in
the performance of its service.
The data do show, as the chairman noted in his remarks,
that cruise ships are relatively safe places to be, for the
most part. According to FBI stats reported at the December
subcommittee hearing, the FBI opened 305 cases of crime on the
high seas over the past 5 years, during which time there were
40 million cruise ship passengers. If those numbers are right,
that is pretty good odds of a safe voyage, certainly a lot
safer than a lot of counties and cities across the country.
But I know one thing. One concern about these statistics is
that many crimes may not be reported, and I hope that is
something that this subcommittee is looking at as well.
Two thousand people are reported missing every day in the
United States. In contrast, over the past 2 years, the
equivalent of one person per one million passengers went
missing on a cruise ship, which is less than the national rate.
A cruise ship is regulated by both the Federal and State
governments, and criminal offenses on board ships, regardless
of their nation of registry, are expressly subject to U.S.
jurisdictions when committed by or against an American.
Having said this, this is an industry that is not used to
visible consumer complaints, and as the industry continues to
grow, they will need to find a more uniform standardized
security standard. No loss of life or crime is ever acceptable,
and I understand the anger and the frustration of crime victims
and their families and loved ones having difficulty pulling
information out. I hope that the industry will address some of
the issues that are highlighted today.
There are compelling questions to be asked, including how
conflicts and overlaps between domestic law and international
treaties affect our ability to monitor and enforce criminal
conduct at sea. I look forward to working with the subcommittee
to ensure the security of our citizens as they take cruises and
we try to maintain better reporting to loved ones and others
who are having difficulty getting information.
I want to thank Mr. Shays for his important oversight.
Thank you.
Mr. Shays. I thank the chairman very much, and at this time
the Chair would recognize Mr. Kucinich and thank him for
yielding to the chairman.
Mr. Kucinich. Of course.
Mr. Chairman, before I begin, I want to say that
immediately after my statement, I have to go to the floor of
the House to enter a statement in opposition to the PATRIOT Act
authorization, and then I will return.
Mr. Shays. I think I would like to keep you here.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Kucinich. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Good afternoon and thank you to the witnesses for appearing
today. I know it is extremely difficult for some of our
panelists today to relate the tragic experiences of their loved
ones, but I hope that your testimony will help us avoid future
tragedies aboard cruise ships. Each year, some 10 million
passengers take trips aboard the 300 large cruise ships that
comprise the worldwide cruise ship fleets. These trips generate
tens of billions of dollars in leisure spending, and more than
half of these passengers embark from North American ports.
Twelve companies account for the majority of cruise ship
activity in the United States, but two companies--Carnival
Corp. and Royal Caribbean--dominate the U.S. market. Carnival
owns 79 ships and has a dozen more in the pipeline. Royal
Caribbean has 19 ships. Most of these vessels sail under
foreign flags and do not have to comply with U.S. labor,
environmental, and other regulations.
Many Americans embark on a cruise as a romantic honeymoon
or on a long-needed family vacation, hoping to travel to exotic
destinations and enjoy the many amenities these cruise ships
have to offer. They are offered almost limitless amounts of
food and entertainment. Alcohol is plentiful and easily
accessible. It is truly a 24-hour party atmosphere on board the
ships. Yet instead of relaxing and enjoying their vacation,
this subcommittee has heard of a disturbing trend: a growing
number of passengers disappearing while on board these cruise
ships, with little or no attempts to search and rescue them by
the ship's crew and security officers.
At our December hearing, the subcommittee heard from Mrs.
Jennifer Hagel-Smith, the widow of George Smith, who went
missing during their honeymoon voyage to the Mediterranean.
Publicity about their case has allowed numerous others to come
forward and relate their cruise ship horror stories. Recently,
individuals affected by cruise ship crimes formed the
International Cruise Victims Organization as a support network
and to give a voice to their cause. What they want simply is
the truth, and that is the same thing that this congressional
subcommittee wants. They and we want to know that everything
that could have possibly been done to help their families to
search and care for their loved ones was done by the cruise
companies. They want peace of mind and closure to the terrible
tragedies. But they cannot get a straight answer from those
companies.
According to data submitted to the subcommittee by the
cruise industry--and, you know, they are not officially
required yet to be reporting to law enforcement agencies--24
passengers have gone missing aboard cruise ships in the past 3
years. This subcommittee knows of at least 178 reports of
sexual assaults, thefts, and hosts of other crimes--not exactly
the ``Love Boat.''
However, as the chairman has stated, the lack of
statistical data on the number of crimes and incidents aboard
cruise ships which was not disclosed until two congressional
subcommittees demanded them and the reliability of that data
leads Congress to suspect that the whole truth is not being
told. We want to know the truth about individual cases. We want
to know the truth about the adequacy of training of crew
members and about the procedures used by security officers, and
we want to know the truth about the general conduct and
screening of crew and security officers aboard these ships.
Do these cruise companies care more about the safety of
their passengers or their bottom line? Is it more important to
make sure missing passengers are found or more urgent for the
ship to reach the next port?
It seems to me that the latter is more important for these
cruise ship lines. I hope today's hearing will help answer some
of those questions.
I want to conclude, Mr. Chairman, by pointing out that I am
in strong support of greater Federal regulation over the cruise
line industry and, in particular, we need key requirements for
reporting incidents aboard cruise ships. There needs to be
oversight on training, conduct, and conditions of crew workers
and security officers and accountability to passengers to
report such incidents.
I want to thank the Chair. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank
you for your leadership on this issue, and I hope that these
hearings will help cruise ship victims and their families
understand what went wrong and what happened aboard these
ships. We should do everything in our power to help them heal
their wounds.
Again, thank you, and, again, thank you to the witnesses
for being here today.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Dennis J. Kucinich
follows:]
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Mr. Shays. I thank the gentleman.
At this time the Chair would recognize Mr. Duncan.
Mr. Duncan. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and
certainly I have expressed my great respect and admiration for
you many times in here, and I will say that again because I
think you are one of the finest chairmen that this Congress
has, and I appreciate the fact that you are presiding over a
very thorough look at this.
I expressed my concern the last time we had a hearing about
this that we sometimes legislate based more on what is on the
24-hour news channels than what we actually should be
legislating on, and it is unfortunate. I wish it was not this
way. You know, there are thousands of horrible, terrible
tragedies happening to people every day in this country. And
can we prevent all those? I wish we could. We cannot. Should we
try to? We should, as much as we can.
I hope that I am a better Member of Congress now than I was
5 years ago, and I hope that I am fortunate enough to be here 5
years from now and better then than I am now, because
everybody, whatever their job is, if they lose the desire to
improve and get better, it is sad for them and it is sad for
the people for whom they work. I hope the cruise line industry
continually tries to do more and better in regard to safety and
security of its passengers.
Having said all that, I mentioned some of this the last
time we had this hearing. People are far, far safer on these
cruise lines than they are in any city or even in any small
town in America. The statistics that Chairman Davis mentioned,
I mean, 10 million passengers a year, 20 million passengers in
a 2-year time period, and there were 13 that went missing in
that 2-year period, 6 or 7 a year. One alleged sexual assault
per 100,000 passengers. You are 100 times more likely to be
sexually assaulted in a city or town in this country.
So, we need to keep these things in mind as we go through
this. Does that lessen what happened to the victims that have
had bad things happen to them on these cruise lines? No, it
does not lessen it. Those are terrible things and we all
sympathize with that. But if we overreact and overregulate, I
mean, we could put so many regulations and rules and red tape
in effect that we make it where only extremely wealthy people
can take cruises. And I certainly do not think we want to do
that. I think in all these things we need to have some balance,
and I think that is what this hearing is trying to achieve.
And so I thank you very much for calling this hearing and
for letting me be here. Thank you.
Mr. Shays. I thank the gentleman very much.
At this time the Chair would recognize Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Mr. Chairman, again, thank you for
having this hearing, the second hearing. Maritime security is a
very complex issue. I am familiar with maritime security. I
represent the Port of Baltimore and also am co-Chair of the
Port Security Caucus, and we are dealing with issues of port
security, the Dubai issues; more importantly, resources that we
put into security.
I really did not get involved with this issue until we had
the first hearing, but I think it is a very important issue.
And one of the reasons it is an important issue is that we have
many Americans that like to go on cruises because cruises are
fun, they are affordable. And I think that these hearings, even
though I am sure the industry does not like it, should be a
wake-up call on looking at your system, making sure that you
are doing things the right way.
You have had a good situation, but if you do not re-
evaluate and make the decisions and the changes that are
necessary for good security--and it is not always what you
think. It is what is being perceived, and perception can hurt
any industry.
Now, we discussed different issues in the last hearing.
There were questions that had been raised and questions that
have not been answered, what laws apply in what situations. The
FBI and the Coast Guard share the burden of enforcing maritime
jurisdiction, but who takes the lead? Who is ultimately
responsible? And I guess we did not answer these questions in
December. Hopefully we can move forward and help the industry
where we need to go, because we do not need to overregulate,
but we do not need to underregulate either. We need to get that
check, get that balance so that the cruise industry can go
forward and Americans can have fun but feel safe.
One question I asked in the hearing was: Do cruise ship
deadlines create a threat? Do stringent deadlines force ships
to travel into storms or unsafe places?
Just to give a personal story, my wife and I went on a
cruise, and probably will not go on another cruise. We were
really knocked out of bed because of bad conditions. I
understand that happens. But, when you have those situations,
you wonder why you were put in that situation and whether it
could be avoided. Probably because a ship has to get back to
port where there are 3,000 people waiting. How you solve that,
that is up to the industry. But these are things that occur
occasionally.
I would be more concerned, though, not about a bad
experience but a life-and-death experience when it really is
something serious. How does the industry make a determination?
Is it the captain's point of view? Do you have the proper
radar? Are you told, like airline pilots, where to go and to
avoid storms? Those type of issues.
Now, the International Council of Cruise Lines wrote
following up on my question about having deadlines and having
to go to certain ports and keeping tight schedules. And I
appreciate the letter and acknowledge that the National
Transportation Safety Board upholds the cruise line practices
as prudent. Still, the larger problem continues to be who is in
charge, what is the system in place to protect the citizens of
our country. And our country, not only within the port, within
the U.S. jurisdiction, but as we know from the previous
hearing, problems that we had when you are in another country,
how you are treated. It seems to me that once you are on a
cruise ship and you enter, you go on the cruise ship from the
United States of America, you should be looked after and
protected all the way through that process.
Now, again, in fairness to the cruise ship industry, the
Coast Guard has said maritime travel is, arguably, among the
safest modes of transportation available. The International
Council of Cruise Lines has established safety standards, but
who enforces them? High standards are not the end of the story.
We must continually work to improve.
It is critical that we solve this problem, establish rules,
and procedures so all agencies involved in security can and
know how they are supposed to work together. And that is the
only way we can ensure ultimate safety when traveling in waters
not of our own.
Thank you.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
I would just like to say for the witnesses, I appreciate
your patience, but what I am hoping you are gaining from this
is realizing how you may want to respond, and if you do not go
directly with your written statement, that will be submitted in
the record. But it is important for you to hear the basic views
of the Members.
I do want to say, just in regard to the statistics, that
you probably need to divide by 52 weeks the 10 million, and you
are probably coming up with a city of about 200,000. Even then
the statistics appear to be still very impressive in the sense
that not as big a problem as in some of our urban areas, but we
are probably talking about a year-long population of about
200,000, give or take.
At this time the Chair would recognize and thank Mr. Van
Hollen for his patience as well. You have the floor, sir.
Mr. Van Hollen. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank
you for holding these hearings, and I welcome all the witnesses
and look forward to your testimony. I hope these hearings will
accomplish two things: First is to raise awareness in the
American public about what questions they need to ask and have
answered as they proceed on cruise ships and just be educated
as to what rules apply and what rules do not apply. And they
need to understand that when you board a cruise ship and leave
the U.S. shores, you do not necessarily carry with you the full
protections of the American laws. And, in fact, in some ways
you are in charted legal waters.
Second, in addition to raising awareness, I hope we will be
able to identify those areas where there may be a need to take
additional measures. No one wants to go overboard in terms of
measures, but I think that it is important that we identify
those areas where it may be helpful. So if that comes out of
these hearings, I think they will have been a success. And I
thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding it.
Mr. Shays. I thank the gentleman and appreciate his
participation.
Let me ask unanimous consent that all members of the
subcommittee be permitted to place an opening statement in the
record and that the record remain open for 3 days for that
purpose, and without objection, so ordered.
I ask further unanimous consent that all witnesses be
permitted to include their written statements in the record,
and without objection, so ordered.
Further, I ask unanimous consent that the following be made
part of the hearing record: a written statement from Mr. Terry
L. Dale, president, Cruise Lines International Association,
about the cruise line industry and taking a vacation on a
cruise ship; a letter from Ms. Kathryn Sudeikis, president,
American Society of Travel Agents, encouraging its members to
take a vacation aboard a cruise ship. And without objection, so
ordered. Without objection, the written statement and the
letter will be made part of the record.
[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Also, unanimous consent to insert a statement
from our colleague, Alcee Hastings of Florida's 23rd District.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Alcee Hastings follows:]
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Mr. Shays. And I would further just point out that we have
the International Cruise Victims Association, which is a
nonprofit organization supporting advocacy, an organization of
cruise victims and their families, and some of these members
are with us today, and we just acknowledge their presence as
well.
As I think the panelists know, we swear in all our
witnesses. I failed to put under oath only one Member in my
years as chairman, and that was the Senator from West Virginia.
I chickened out. But everyone else has been, and so let me just
first announce our witnesses. We have Mr. Kendall Carver from
Phoenix, AZ. We have Mr. Son Michael Pham, Bellevue, WA. We
have Ms. Deborah Shaffer of Tucson, AZ. We have Ms. Janet
Kelly, Cottonwood, AZ. We have Mr. Ira Leonard of Hamden, CT,
and we have Mr. Brian Mulvaney, Miami, FL.
And let me say to the witnesses that we would ask you to
stand and we will now swear you in.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Shays. Note for the record all our witnesses have
responded in the affirmative.
I suspect this is probably the first time you have ever
appeared before Congress, and if not, you have had a little
practice. But if not, the worst thing you can do is try to
speak too quickly. It would be better to just close off your
comments than try to rush through. Be assured that you are
going to be able to make your points through the questions and
so on. So you are not going to leave here wishing you did not
say something, unless you simply forgot to say it, but you will
be given that opportunity.
We are going to go down the line, and, Mr. Carver, the mic
should have a light on it noting that it is on. Just tap it
here just to see. Yes, you are all right. OK, welcome. Lovely
to have you here.
STATEMENTS OF KENDALL CARVER, PHOENIX, AZ; SON MICHAEL PHAM,
BELLEVUE, WA; DEBORAH SHAFFER, TUCSON, AZ; JANET KELLY,
COTTONWOOD, AZ; IRA LEONARD, HAMDEN, CT; AND BRIAN MULVANEY,
MIAMI, FL
STATEMENT OF KENDALL CARVER
Mr. Carver. I would like to take this opportunity to thank
the subcommittee for accepting our testimony in connection with
the disappearance of our daughter, Merrian Lynn Carver.
Merrian disappeared during the third week of August in the
year 2002. We contacted the police in Cambridge, MA, where she
lived. They determined through credit card transactions that
she had purchased a round-trip ticket to Seattle, returning
from Vancouver, and a ticket on the Celebrity Cruise Line Ship
Mercury leaving Seattle on August 27th. Merrian disappeared
from that ship.
I provided supporting material to the subcommittee, which
goes into considerable detail, and I would like to summarize
our experience with the cruise line. Since they were not able
to provide the necessary answers to our questions through the
Risk Management Department, we retained both private
investigators and law firms to investigate her disappearance.
Some months later we uncovered the following facts: The
steward servicing our daughter's cabin reported her missing to
the supervisor each day for 5 days. The supervisor told the
steward ``just do your job and that's it.''
At the end of the cruise, some of Merrian's clothing and
personal items were disposed of and other items were put in
storage. No effort was made to report Merrian's disappearance
either to the authorities or to her family. In effect, these
actions or lack of actions kept Merrian's disappearance from
being discovered until the Cambridge Police acted, which was
over 3 weeks later, and in effect, she vanished from the Earth.
During the third week in September, the management of Royal
Caribbean--``the owners'' of the cruise ship, took steps to
cover up the facts concerning her disappearance. These actions
are covered in documents which are provided on the table under
supplemental folder, which I have provided.
At the end of September, we hired the detective agency of
Kroll and Associates and the law firm of Blake and Associates
to investigate her disappearance.
Throughout the investigation, the Royal Caribbean Cruise
Line took every step to impede the efforts of our detective
agencies and law firms. Officials of the cruise line provided
both inaccurate and misleading information and kept our
investigators from questioning members of the crew.
Cruise line officials also withheld information that would
have been helpful, including information that we had requested
by subpoena on both December 2, 2004 and January 24, 2005.
Only after we went to the courts in Florida and
Massachusetts at the end of December were we able to force crew
members that had knowledge of her disappearance to be deposed.
In other words, it took us 4\1/2\ months to get to one crew
member that had seen Merrian on that ship.
On January 16th and 17th, we finally deposed the steward
and the head of the hotel of the cruise. At that point we
discovered for the first time the fact that our daughter had
been reported missing daily starting August 29th and no action
was taken. In other words, it took us, as I just said, 4\1/2\
months to interview a member of the crew and that cost over
$75,000.
On February 9th, we received only one item from two
subpoenas that had been issued, and that was a poor-quality
picture of Merrian getting on the boat. So we took the
direction of going directly to the Board of Directors of the
Royal Caribbean Cruise Line with all the depositions showing
the coverup, hoping that we could jump-start action concerning
her case.
We are now a year later, and I must say that we still have
not received the information that we subpoenaed on December
2nd, and that exercise was not helpful.
I do not understand why a reputable corporation would
attempt to cover up the disappearance of our daughter. Did some
officials of this cruise line assume that the families would
not have the financial or emotional resources to investigate
this matter thoroughly?
The needless stress that my wife and I have endured while
we have struggled with a large corporation for information
about our missing daughter has made our loss even more
difficult to bear.
As a result of the last hearings, there has been much press
concerning Merrian in various news media around the world, and
we have received comments. There was a comment in the Arizona
Republic, which I would like to read to you, and it says, in
effect, ``I agree with the other respondents; Royal Caribbean
is grossly negligent in this case. By dragging their feet,
providing misinformation, getting rid of a person with
information (the supervisor) and destroying evidence they are
at least guilty of obstruction of justice.''
Now, is this case unique? I think it is unique because I
don't think anyone else has spent the time and the resources to
break through the coverup, which we did.
Mr. Shays. How much have you spent, just for the record?
Mr. Carver. Way over $75,000.
Are we unique? If you read the attachments in my summary
documents, you will find that few, if any, individuals are ever
successfully convicted of a crime on a cruise ship. In fact, by
their own statement in the Jacksonville Business Journal in
June of the year 2005, a Royal Caribbean representative,
Michael Sheehan, indicated they do not keep statistics on
missing passengers. I find that hard to believe.
Now, what can we conclude from our experiences and the
experiences of other victims?
If something happens to you or a loved one on a cruise
ship, you are on your own. Don't expect the crew of the ship or
governmental agencies, which I would include the FBI, onshore
to assist you in your effort. You are on your own.
Because of jurisdictional issues, you cannot assume what
laws will govern your situation. This issue was reviewed in
great detail in the February 26th issue of the New York Times.
In my opinion, the current system is broke and desperately
needs reform to assure the safety of passengers on cruise
ships.
Unless something is changed in the current regulations, the
cruise line industry will be able to treat the next family as
we were treated. God save the next family.
After the subcommittee's hearing last December, the Smiths
and I determined that we needed to make a change to the
industry. As a result, we have formed a group of victims. This
organization is called International Cruise Victims. Our Web
site can be found at www.international-cruisevictims.org.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Carver, I am going to ask you to kind of
close up here.
Mr. Carver. OK. Well, let me just read a summary statement
here.
Mr. Shays. Sure.
Mr. Carver. From a crew member, we received this a week
ago: As a crew member from Vancouver, with employment on
several major lines over the last 8 years, your story only
touches the tip of the iceberg. It is an exhaustive study you
will find on behalf of your loved ones, which keeps this issue
front and center. Many families have not come forward. Instead
they intend to believe the cruise line when they reiterate
their old, tired response that this is a suicide. In addition
to the many guests going missing, there are numerous crew
members each year which go unreported because they are from
Third World countries.
And to put a positive spin to what I have said, which is
not a positive story----
Mr. Shays. You need to close up now.
Mr. Carver. Yes. We would like to enter into the record a
list of recommendations to be considered to change the cruise
line industry.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Carver follows:]
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Mr. Shays. All right. Thank you very much. We have copies
of that. Thank you.
Let me tell you that, in my judgment, however this hearing
concludes and whatever we do, what you have gone through is
outrageous, and we would respectfully request that the cruise
line totally and completely cooperate with your need to know
what happened, etc. So I just hope, if nothing else happens, we
will at least see some change in how they have responded. To
fire this superintendent is not satisfying the need for you to
know.
Mr. Pham.
STATEMENT OF SON MICHAEL PHAM
Mr. Pham. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the
subcommittee. I am honored to be here today along with several
families of victims of the cruise industry immediately behind
me, including John and Jill Savone, who lost a son from the
same cruise ship in 1999, to speak on issues of cruise ship
safety, security, and accountability.
I would like to start out by saying that I am not an expert
on safety and security issues aboard cruise ships. However, I
am more educated today than I was before May 2005.
Unfortunately for my family, it is too late to prevent what
happened to us. But I know by being here today it is not too
late for me to help others from becoming victims like all of
us.
Since the time is limited, I am going to skip through what
I submitted to the record of my testimony and tell you a little
of the background of my folks.
Briefly, more than 30 years ago my parents and five of us
left South Vietnam on the day before Saigon City fell to the
communists. We risked our lives spending 2 weeks in the Pacific
Ocean with little food and water. We came here with nothing so
that we could live in freedom. We came to the United States
with nothing and worked hard for everything we have today. As
American citizens, we obey the rules and laws of the country,
we cherish our freedom, and we trust the justice system to
protect our rights.
Last May 2005, all of the children treated Mom and Dad to a
vacation, a trip to Chicago to visit the grandchildren followed
by a 7-day Caribbean cruise, then back to Chicago for 2 more
weeks with the grandkids. The cruise was a Mother's Day gift,
traveling with their daughter and granddaughter. On May 12,
2005, my parents vanished from the Carnival Destiny when the
ship was sailing between the islands of Barbados and Aruba. The
Mother's Day gift turned into another tragic and mysterious
disappearance from a Carnival Cruise Line ship.
On the evening of May 12th, a ship photographer reported
that she noticed personal belongings by lounge chairs on the
third deck, two pair of sandals, and a purse. The family hung
our regularly in this area, lounging on the chairs, and Mom and
Dad would leave their sandals and personal belongings on the
chairs or deck between them. A crew member retrieved the found
items, notified the assistant chief of security, and was told
to log the items and phone the room. Thirty minutes later, the
other family members came back to their cabin and received a
phone call from the front desk to retrieve the found items.
Then they realized something unusual had happened and alerted
the crew members. This is at midnight.
Following our parents' disappearance, it took almost 3
hours later before the first general announcement was made over
the public speakers. The crew waited for over 4 hours before
notifying the U.S. Coast Guard and allowed the ship to further
distance itself from the location where our parents were
originally reported missing. Too much time had elapsed between
the U.S. Coast Guard notification and the first search and
rescue from the Netherlands Coast Guard. Under the direction of
the Coast Guard, the ship turned around to participate in the
search mission. It took 12 hours before the Destiny vessel
returned to the original location. The full search and rescue
mission was called off. You know why it was called off? In less
than 13 hours from the presumed time of our parents'
disappearance, based on the information provided by the ship's
captain to the Coast Guard that survivability was very low. We
have that record from the Coast Guard.
We believe there is more detailed information on our
parents' cause of death than what is actually being released by
Carnival Cruise Line. Four hours went by before the security
and surveillance on-duty investigator was contacted--4 hours.
Then an additional 30 minutes went by before he contacted the
FBI. It took them 4 hours to decide to look in the security
camera to find out if they found anything about my parents. The
area where the personal belongings were found was left
unprotected for 7 hours until the FBI requested a crew to seal
off the area. Guess what happened when the FBI showed up in St.
Maarten? They boarded the ship when people got off the ship at
the same time because they came there to take a report. They
went on the ship to interview my family members and some of the
crew members and that is it. People got off the ship. Nobody
had a chance to speak or be questioned by the FBI.
Then another thing. My family reported last seeing my
family at 7:20 p.m. Eleven and a half hours after my parents
were reported missing, the cabin housekeeping attendant
reported to the captain that he saw my parents at 8:45 p.m. So
during all that time they were searching the wrong place in
this big, big vast ocean. They were clueless. They did not talk
to everybody, apparently. They were more focused on planning
the next day's short activities in St. Maarten, which is a
replacement for Aruba, than protecting crucial information and
evidence pertaining to two of their missing passengers; our
parents.
The FBI met the ship in St. Maarten to interview some crew
members. I mentioned about that. These are two American
citizens with no personal and financial problems, no serious
health problems, living the happiest time of their lives, both,
just like many others, vanished without a trace, witness, or
surveillance tapes of what happened to them.
After my family members were left off in San Juan, the
cruise ship, just clean up the ship, people got off, big chaos
going on, and then that is when they handed out the flyer from
the FBI that anyone having information to contact the FBI. And
that is it. The arrogant ``business as usual'' attitude by
Carnival Cruise Line is the normal ``take no responsibility''
reaction of the world's largest cruise company, accounting for
more than half the world's cruise industry travelers. It is
important to note that the majority of their passengers are
citizens of the United States of America.
I am going to wrap up. Currently the Death on the High Seas
Act [DOHSA], a 1920's law enacted by the U.S. Congress, is
still in effect, with complicated jurisdictional issues,
continues to protect the cruise industry from being held
accountable for the safety and security of its passengers. It
is time for our Government to bring the DOHSA to the 21st
century.
My only recommendation is nothing is going to happen from
these hearings, nothing is going to happen with us being here
today, nothing is going to happen until the cruise industry
admits that we do have problems, we do have issues. Don't look
at the statistics. We do have problems. And then that will be
the very, very first step before something being done.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Pham follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you very much for your testimony, and we
will look forward to having dialog with you.
Ms. Shaffer, you need to bring the mic a little closer to
you. Thank you, and take your time.
Ms. Shaffer. Can you hear me?
Mr. Shays. I hear you fine.
STATEMENT OF DEBORAH SHAFFER
Ms. Shaffer. I am Deborah Savage Shaffer, the mother of
four daughters, all currently teenagers except for the oldest,
who is 21 and living on her own. I have been a widow for the
past 12 years and I am currently a full-time Mom.
The reason that I have been invited to tell my story today
is because I am a member of International Cruise Victims, a
group that was formed mainly to get the word out to the public,
domestically as well as internationally, of the well-kept and
expertly hidden secret of the criminal activities and dangers
that are occurring on board these cruise ships and to educate
the public of the cruise lines' standard procedures in dealing
with criminal or potential criminal problems. We hope
education, information, and regulations will gave passengers,
as well as cruise line employees, rights, security, and
protection.
In April 2003, I took a 10-day cruise with my four
daughters to the southern Caribbean on board the Carnival
Cruise Lines' Legend. I shared a balcony room with my 13-year-
old and my 15-year-old. My other two daughters shared an
interior room down the hall. When we departed from the dock, my
daughters and I were standing on the balcony of our room as we
slowly moved away from port. I should have been tipped off that
all was not as it appeared, when as we stood enjoying the
breeze and sensation of the departure we were bowled over by
the strong, pungent smell of marijuana. We tried to see where
it was coming from, but it was impossible because of the design
of the ship and balconies.
Boarding the ship had taken hours, possibly half a day. It
was the most detailed security check-in that I had ever been
through and definitely surpassed the airports and airlines, in
my opinion. So how did the marijuana get on board? But with the
excitement of the day, I dismissed the thought. I felt safe,
secure, and had no doubt that everyone on board this ship had
to be reputable and of good character. It was not anything that
I gave any more thought to. Passing through the intense
security measures of the cruise line, once on board the ship I
felt 100 percent safe, secure, and trusting. The crew seemed
open, friendly, and professional. I subconsciously let my guard
down. Right away, my kids met other kids their own age, and
they were all busy running around the ship together.
The first evening on board, my 15-year-old daughter met a
young girl her own age, and they were hanging out together. My
daughter was supposed to be back to our cabin by 10 p.m., but
when she arrived, I was already in bed asleep. She brought her
new friend into the room to meet me. So we turned on the light,
her friend sat down, and the three of us talked for a while.
Then they said they wanted to go back to the girl's cabin to
watch a video. I told my daughter to be back by midnight. I
fell back to sleep thinking my daughter would wake me up again
when she got in. But at 4 a.m., I woke up, startled that she
had not come back. I jumped out of bed, and in my pajamas I ran
down the hall to Security.
It took about an hour to get everyone moving on finding my
daughter, but after giving them a first name of the girl that
she was with, it seemed that they only knocked on one door
before finding my daughter. She came out of the room rubbing
her swollen, puffy eyes. I was very angry with her, but
believed that she had just fallen asleep. I asked her what had
happened, as she was very defensive. She was overreacting to my
questions, but at that time I had no suspicion that a rape had
just occurred.
One or 2 days later, my 13-year-old daughter came to me and
told me that she had been informed by my 15-year-old daughter
and the new girlfriend that the girl's brother had raped my
daughter that night.
I then confronted my 15-year-old daughter, but she denied
it. She told me that nothing had happened. She became overly
hysterical and cried in denial constantly, whenever I tried to
approach the subject. I knew by her over-emotional behavior
that she was lying and that something had happened. I took her
to the ship's doctor 3 days in a row, but each time she would
become hysterical and deny the rape. Each visit brought nothing
but solemn and somber stares from the doctor for as long as I
wanted to sit there requesting an examination. He told me that
if my daughter is telling me the truth and if, in fact, she is
still a virgin, having never had a pelvic exam, that by him
examining her the examination in itself would be violating her
and that my insistence of an examination would traumatize her
for life.
I had become the perpetrator. The captain called me in to
talk to me on two occasions after this. He told me that we were
on ``international waters.'' He did not tell me what that
meant. He told me that he felt badly, but that since we have no
proof of the rape, there was nothing that could be done. He
told me that he has two daughters of his own and that he felt
very badly about the incident. The rapist was the friend's 30-
year-old brother who was sharing a cabin with her and her
younger brother.
I had no one to consult with, no one to turn to. I didn't
know what to do. Finishing up the trip on that cruise was
laborious, and for much of the trip I didn't come out of my
room. It was one of the worst experiences of my entire life.
I have since learned the true story of what happened that
night, as 3 years of maturity have given my daughter the
courage and character to discuss it. After becoming aware of
the Jennifer Hagel-Smith story and the Ken Carver story, she
told me that she was now ready to tell me what really happened
on that first night on board the Legend after leaving our room
to go to the newly found friend's room to watch the video.
My daughter had climbed into one of the bunks, and while
watching the video she fell asleep. The next thing she knew,
there was a man on top of her. The room was dark. She thought
it was the girl's father. He had alcohol breath. She told him
that she needed to get up, but he wouldn't let her. She started
to scream and he covered her mouth, muffling her screams and
proceeded to rape her. The next thing she knew, there was
knocking on the door of the room and that was when we found
her.
She denied the rape because she thought it was her fault
and also because she was embarrassed and didn't want ``the
whole world to know.'' She is not sure at what point she
realized it was the girl's 30-year-old brother.
Rape is an earth-shattering, traumatizing experience that
kills the person that you are and slowly changes you into
someone else.
From that day forward, my daughter has distanced herself
emotionally from me. Now she never shares her innermost
thoughts with me. Losing her father almost 12 years ago and
then being raped 8 years later is an enormous hurt in her whole
being that could never begin to heal until she was able to
address what had happened.
I am extremely thankful to the Hagel-Smith family and to
Ken Carver for coming forward and standing up for what is right
and being brave enough to insist that people listen to the
truth. With their efforts and the efforts of other cruise
victims who could not be here today, my daughter has been able
to take her first step in the healing process. And as her
mother, whose goal in life was to raise her four daughters to
at least the age of 18 without being sexually abused, I have
lived with the fact that I failed my daughter over these past 3
years. I was not able to protect her or defend her.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Shaffer follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Ms. Shaffer, thank you so much for your
testimony, and the one thing I am certain is you have not
failed your daughter.
Ms. Shaffer. Thank you.
Mr. Shays. It is pretty remarkable to raise four young
ladies without a partner. Very remarkable.
Ms. Kelly, if you would bring that mic to you?
I just want to ask you, Ms. Shaffer, is your daughter in
agreement that you should give testimony today or are you
sharing this information without her consent?
Ms. Shaffer. She is very ashamed. She has not even at this
point----
Mr. Shays. How about just giving me the answer?
Ms. Shaffer. She is 18. It is so hard----
Mr. Shays. Let me ask you the question, though. Is she
asking you not to or is she just indifferent?
Ms. Shaffer. She did not ask me not to.
Mr. Shays. OK. But she didn't ask you to.
Ms. Shaffer. She is not happy about it, but she did not ask
me not to.
Mr. Shays. OK. Well, we will just make sure that what you
shared will lead to some good so that your daughter will see
that.
Ms. Shaffer. I hope so.
Mr. Shays. Ms. Kelly.
Ms. Kelly. Can you hear me?
Mr. Shays. We hear you fine.
STATEMENT OF JANET KELLY
Ms. Kelly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and the subcommittee
also. My name is Janet Kelly. I would like to begin by telling
a little bit about myself. I am a happily married woman to the
same man, Rick Kelly. He is sitting behind me today.
Mr. Shays. For the record, he smiled.
Ms. Kelly. We are going on 30 years of marriage. God help
us, huh? We live in an average size town in Arizona, and we
have two sons, who are the love of our life.
I am a successful realtor for a large firm going into my
4th year of sales. My husband is also a hard-working man. We
are a traditional family, traditional values. We work hard, pay
our taxes, go to church, give back to our community. And, above
all, we do obey the law.
In February 2000--we had been beat up pretty good--we had
lost our daughter, and my husband had a heart attack 6 months
later. I decided to do a ``healing cruise,'' 4 days with some
neighbors. I had hoped to relax, regroup, and return home to my
family. It was a long overdue vacation, and I could have never
anticipated the following: On the last night of the cruise,
shortly before dinner, I was drugged by a bartender employed by
the cruise line. He led me a remote bathroom marked ``crew
members only'' and sexually assaulted me when I was in a semi-
conscious and unconscious state.
I cannot begin to describe to you today the pain,
humiliation, and suffering this incident inflicted on me and my
family. Instead of being able to regroup after everything that
had transpired in our family, we were again totally fractured.
I did report the crime to my local authorities, who
informed me that the FBI had jurisdiction over crimes at sea.
But it took the FBI months to investigate and interview the
assailant who raped me. They did not prosecute him, even though
they had my clothing, the rape kit completed at my local
hospital, the individual's identity, and my testimony. The
authorities had my full and complete cooperation to do whatever
was necessary to apprehend and bring the criminal to justice.
After the FBI interviewed this criminal, he remained on the
same ship. I was terrified that I had been exposed to HIV, and
it was only after filing my civil suit against the cruise line
that the cruise line conceded to have his tested for HIV. They
fired him and sent him back to his homeland, Jamaica.
I did write a letter to my Senator, along with 200
congressional leaders. I was concerned for others' safety as I
walked off that ship, and for good reason. I felt that the
injustice of what happened to me has never been righted. In my
letter I proposed the same changes, back in 2000, which I will
again propose today.
For the record, I would like to inform Congress that my
assailant went on later that same year and was re-employed with
yet another cruise line. And I am not happy about that. It was
determined that he falsified his application and they fired
him. But where is he now?
This is hardly the image portrayed on the cruise line
advertisements. Could this rapist and others like himself be on
another cruise line? And how is it that these huge cruise
corporations continue to operate business as usual with
absolutely no accountability for the crimes that occur on their
ships?
I am going to suggest the following, and these are the same
recommendations I had made back in 2000: U.S. Marshals be
present on cruise ships; a main data base of terminated
individuals and employees that all cruise lines must report to.
I want to add here, too, that there needs to be communication
between the FBI and the cruise lines because I think there is a
real breakdown in that area. Changes in legislation, making
these cruise lines safe for U.S. passengers. Warnings to
passengers. This incident happened to me on my last night of
the cruise, and I think that is when most people are
vulnerable.
In closing, over the past 6 years since my ordeal, I have
heard too many stories about cruise victim after victim. The
injustice of these crimes burns my very soul. Two of the people
that disappeared on these cruise lines--George Smith and Jim
Scavone--disappeared on my youngest son's birthday, July 5th.
Enough is enough. Having been a victim, I feel each one of
these families' pain. I offer all the families that have lost
loved ones my sincere condolences. Your children's deaths are
not in vain. By being strong and coming forward with your
testimonies, you can give your loved ones a voice today and
prevent the next unnecessary death. I ask that you not be
intimidated by these cruise companies. They are big, they are
wealthy, they are powerful. But they will bend under the weight
of your conviction.
I want to add I feel honored to be here today as a
representative of hundreds of cruise victims who do not have a
voice. And thank you for letting me speak today. I want to say
a prayer to the Lord that you are successful in making the
necessary changes so that crimes at sea diminish and all of us
can get on with healing and put all this trauma behind us once
and for all. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Kelly follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you, Ms. Kelly. It is very admirable of
you to come and testify today.
Ms. Kelly. It was not easy.
Mr. Shays. I am sure it was not.
Ms. Kelly. I got through it, though.
Mr. Shays. I can understand why your husband has a nice
smile. I am sure he is very proud of you.
Ms. Kelly. Thank you.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Leonard.
STATEMENT OF IRA LEONARD
Mr. Leonard. Good afternoon.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Leonard, I am going to ask you to put that
mic on top of those papers you have there and put it closer to
you.
Mr. Leonard. Better.
Mr. Shays. That is better.
Mr. Leonard. OK. Good afternoon. My name is Ira Leonard. My
wife and I are retired college teachers. We do not represent
any organization concerned with today's activities, nor are we
involved in a lawsuit or possessor of any Federal grant or
contract, now or during the last 2 years.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Leonard, we do hear you, but we need that
mic closer to you.
Mr. Leonard. OK.
Mr. Shays. I know you are a professor and so do not easily
take suggestions.
Mr. Leonard. We are here today because my wife and I were
victims of a grand larceny on board a Royal Caribbean
International cruise ship on June 2, 2004, in Bermuda. The
Royal Caribbean International not only refused to discuss the
theft with us, but eventually denied to an officer of the
Federal Maritime Commission that it ever took place. This is
the letter.
We reported the theft early in the morning when we
discovered the loss. Six hours later, the official search was
conducted, and the jewelry worth $6,700 was not found.
We filed a signed statement, using an RCI form, with the
aid of the ship's chief security officer, William MacLaughlin.
This is the signed statement.
MacLaughlin told us the theft was a crime of opportunity
and the jewelry was most likely out on the streets. What made
it a crime of opportunity, we are convinced, was the negligence
of the staff before the theft as well as immediately after the
theft.
First, there was no safe in the room. Our steward said the
room was secure because it could only be entered with the key
cards. The steward said there were only three people with
access to the room: my wife, me, and himself. Yet my wife was
issued four different key cards over a period of 2 days in
order to have proper access to our room, which we reported in
our signed statement.
The first key card did not work. The second did not work
because it was to somebody else's room. The third key card
worked, but had my name on it, so she had to be issued yet
another card with her name on it. The fourth card worked. None
of the key cards were destroyed in front of her. The third card
worked and had the last three digits, 0-2-0, of our four-digit
room number on it, as well as our dinner seating time, 8:30
p.m., as did her fourth key card. Anyone with knowledge of the
ship would know exactly when we would not be in the room and
could try rooms 3020, 4020, etc.
Chief Security Officer MacLaughlin specifically told us
after the burglary that the key cards should have been cut up
in front of my wife. We feel that the key card incidents were
evidence of negligence and lack of security. Guest Relations
Manager Luis Martins kept dismissing the notion of multiple key
cards as being a problem, insisting they had been deactivated
when they were turned in. However, at approximately 3 p.m. in
Guest Relations on Saturday after the burglary, we and several
other passengers witnessed a crew member with a box of key
cards cutting them up into little pieces.
Key cards are also used as credit cards, which presents
another security problem. On May 31st, we ordered drinks in the
Schooner Lounge at 11 p.m., our first drinks of the evening,
and our only drinks, handing our key card to the waitress. When
neither the drinks nor the card had arrived by 11:45 p.m., we
went looking for her. She said she had asked another person to
deliver our drinks. The card with all of our information was
out of our presence for 45 minutes. A situation like this
presents an opportunity for burglary, identity theft, planting
of contraband in a room, etc., if someone was so inclined.
Luis Martins told us that our statement and the chief
security officer's report about the burglary were being
forwarded to Royal Caribbean International in Miami. He gave us
their card and instructed us to contact them upon returning
home. He also told us not to worry and to continue enjoying the
cruise because ``Royal Caribbean has a reputation for doing the
right thing.'' We were naive enough at the time to believe that
Royal Caribbean International would do the right thing, but we
no longer enjoyed the cruise.
We repeatedly asked Mr. Martins for a copy of our signed
statement reporting the theft and a copy of the chief security
officer's report, but it was not until my wife told him on
Saturday afternoon we were not getting off the ship without a
copy of our report that he delivered a copy of our signed
statement, but he would not give us a copy of the security
officer's report.
We reported the burglary as instructed to Royal Caribbean
Representative Betty Taillefer, Personal Property Guest
Relations, in Miami on June 9th, the day after we arrived home.
It is at this point that the saga really began for us.
She said she had not received any information about the
theft from Empress of the Seas. Pursuant to our phone
conversation with her, we faxed her a copy of our signed
shipboard statement along with additional statements made to
her that day and again on June 29th. Betty Taillefer sent us
two identical RCI form letters in which she dismissed company
responsibility, directing us to the cruise documents disclaimer
of responsibility and officially referring to the grand larceny
as ``an unfortunate incident.''
We reported the theft to the Federal Maritime Commission in
August 2004. An agent told us that the Commission sought to act
as an intermediary and work our solutions, but it had no
coercive power to do so. On January 26, 2005, the Federal
Maritime Commission agent said she contacted Ms. Betty
Taillefer, and Ms. Taillefer sent her the same form letter she
sent us, referring her to the cruise documents. When the agent
requested Ms. Taillefer to send her a copy of Security Chief
MacLaughlin's report, Taillefer said she would, but it has not
been forthcoming. Instead, Betty Taillefer faxed the Federal
Maritime Commission this letter, which says, ``We contacted our
vessel and no notice of incident was reported.''
``We have contacted our vessel and no notice of incident
was reported.'' Yet I have here the signed report.
Mr. Shays. I am sorry, Mr. Leonard, if you would bring it
to----
Mr. Leonard. We are just about done.
Mr. Shays. OK.
Mr. Leonard. We sent the president of AAA all of our
information since AAA booked us and asked how AAA could in good
conscience continue to book their members on Royal Caribbean
International without informing them about the potential
problems with key cards, thefts, etc. Vice President for AAA
Travel Services Sandra Hughes sent us a letter in which she
assured us, that our claim had been reviewed properly and
appropriately, and AAA had ``verified that when a new key card
is produced, the previous key card is deactivated as a security
measure.'' I guess that is why my wife and I and other RCI
guests saw a Guest Relations staff member busily cutting dozens
of key cards 2 days after the burglary.
Finally, on April 20, 2005, we wrote to Captain Howard
Newhoff, Security Manager for Royal Caribbean International,
asking for the official report by RCI of the grand larceny to
some law enforcement agency. A few days later, Betty Taillefer
called us to tell us personally that RCI did not have to report
thefts of less than $10,000 and followed it up with this letter
that says precisely that.
Mr. Shays. Thank you, Mr. Leonard. We are going to go to
Mr. Mulvaney. If you want to just----
Mr. Leonard. I have one more line.
Mr. Shays. Go for it.
Mr. Leonard. This is ``bingo'' time. In this week's Time
Magazine, Captain Bill Wright, head of RCI Fleet Operations,
told the reporter that Royal Caribbean discloses every
incident, even petty thefts, to authorities. We are still
waiting to find out to which law enforcement agency RCI
reported our grand larceny. Perhaps this subcommittee can find
out for us.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Leonard, we will find out for you.
Mr. Leonard. All right.
Mr. Shays. Because this subcommittee has some real
questions about the accuracy of the statistics that the
industry provides to us, so it will be a good follow-through.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Leonard follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Mr. Mulvaney.
STATEMENT OF BRIAN MULVANEY
Mr. Mulvaney. Good afternoon. I am appearing before you
today to tell you about a terrible tragedy which happened to a
beautiful young girl, Lynsey O'Brien. I want to tell you about
this tragedy and how it could have been avoided and urge you to
consider passing a new law to prevent it from happening to any
other family.
I am a childhood friend of the O'Brien family. We grew up
on the same street. The O'Brien children and my children are
lifelong friends. The O'Briens traveled from Ireland to the
United States to visit with us before we took off on a cruise
from Fort Lauderdale and returned to Fort Lauderdale.
The O'Briens brought with them four children and returned
with only three.
Lynsey, who was a vibrant 15-year-old girl, died as a
result of a bartender on the Cost Cruise line serving her
excessive amounts of alcohol, more than 10, knowing she was a
minor. This bartender served these drinks despite the bold
statement in the passenger contract that ``no minor will be
served alcohol under age of 21 years old.'' There were signs
all over the ship to the effect that alcohol will not be served
to any persons under 21 years of age. Despite those warnings
and signs posted, Lynsey was served more than 10 drinks and
died on January 5th as a result. The alcohol affected her so
much, she was so intoxicated that it was reported she was
vomiting over the balcony and fell overboard.
Through this tragedy, I have come to learn how difficult it
is for victims and their families to seek justice. I know of no
other commercial enterprise afforded such blanket coverage as
the cruise industry. If alcohol is served to a 15-year-old in
the United States, the bartender would be arrested, prosecuted,
as well as the proprietors of the business and their liquor
license would surely be revoked from the premises. Just because
this action took place on board a ship should not insulate the
bartender and the company from being held accountable for their
criminal conduct.
The message must be delivered to the cruise lines that if
they take passengers from a U.S. port, they are responsible to
return them safely or be held accountable if they commit crimes
or acts of gross negligence. I cannot imagine a worse crime
than plying a 15-year-old girl with so much liquor she
literally died as a direct result. What makes this utterly
unbearable is that the cruise ships believe they have limited
accountability for their actions.
There can be no moral argument to changing this law, only
commercial. The shareholders demand great protection and
receive that. Why not the lifeblood of the industry--we, the
passengers? I do not support overregulation of private
industry. What I do support is a victim's right to a full and
fair account of their unfortunate circumstance and their
ability to seek justice without being prohibited by laws
enacted prior to the sinking of the Titanic. The pleasure
cruise industry has grown today and was not envisioned to be
this great by the sponsors of this law when it was originally
enacted. This is a growth industry. The percentage of victims
may not change; however, the number of victims certainly will
over the future.
We encourage people from other countries to come to the
United States and enjoy our country. We encourage people from
other countries to spend money here. My childhood friend, Paul
O'Brien, sought help from the FBI and was told that there was
nothing that can be done because they were not U.S. citizens.
The United States needs to change its laws so that cruise ships
coming and going from U.S. ports such as this are held
accountable to all people traveling on those ships.
Nothing can bring Lynsey back, but by changing the law,
perhaps we can save another family a lifetime of anguish
without their loved one.
What we ask of the subcommittee is for you to put into
place policies and procedures on these cruise lines with teeth
in them, not just signs that are window dressings, to be sure
that alcohol is not served to minors. Cruise ships who pick up
passengers in the United States should be protected by U.S. law
so the FBI will have jurisdiction to investigate and determine
if criminal law has been violated and so the violators should
be prosecuted. The DOHSA should be amended retroactively, like
the one following the airplane disaster, so there is
responsibility to the cruise ships, the only real means of
deterrence.
On behalf of the O'Brien family, I would like to thank you
for allowing me to speak today.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Mulvaney follows:]
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Mr. Shays. We thank you for your testimony. We thank all of
you for your testimony. We will look forward to the dialog we
will have.
I am going to be calling on Mr. Lynch first, and then, Mr.
Duncan, if you would like to go second. I am going to have the
staff ask some questions, and then I will be asking questions.
Thank you. Mr. Lynch, you have 10 minutes.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you. I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman, and
at the outset I want to thank you for taking the leadership on
this issue, and I commend you for your continued efforts to
improve security and incident responses and investigation
aboard international cruise ships.
In addition, I want to just take a moment to thank the
witnesses because it is your powerful testimony here today that
will eventually lead to changes. And we have a situation here
that you have brought to the notice of the U.S. Congress and
others that the heart of our problem here is that in each and
every incident that was described here today, the cruise line
themselves has control of the crime scene. They have control of
the employees. They have control of the evidence. They have
control of the notification of law enforcement authorities. And
this situation has arisen haphazardly. It is because there has
been a lack of focus on these very issues, and in some cases,
it is because the incidents have been deliberately concealed
from the public until you have testified here today and in
other cases previously, and you have had the courage to come
forward. I know it is very difficult for you in many cases to
talk about your loved ones, Mr. Carver, Ms. Kelly, and others.
And I appreciate the difficulty that must present to you. And I
can only pledge my energies to try to help come up with a plan,
along with the chairman, to try to introduce some law and order
on these ships so that we can feel safe when our loved ones go
on a cruise.
But, Ms. Kelly, I just wanted to ask you, after you
reported the crime in your case, do you know of any actions
that the ship's security officers took in response to your
particular complaint?
Ms. Kelly. No, I know of nothing until it--well, it was a
process, but what I did is I notified the authorities right
away when I got home, and then I just assumed, like in America,
that once you report something, that there was going to be
followup. It was actually a couple weeks before the FBI
actually went on--actually, no, no, no. It was 2 weeks before
they came out and interviewed me, and then I just kept calling
and trying to get answers as to what was going on. You know,
and you would get no response. And then it was 2 months before
they went in and actually interviewed him, but there was no
prosecution. I mean, they did not prosecute him.
Mr. Lynch. Was there any explanation given to you after you
reported it, after the assailant was interviewed, he remained
employed for a while until you brought--as I understand the
record, it was not until you brought the civil suit----
Ms. Kelly. That is correct.
Mr. Lynch [continuing]. That he was actually discharged.
Ms. Kelly. That is correct. If I had not done what I did--
and it was my one and only lawsuit. I don't believe in suing
people, truthfully. I mean, I am not going to sue over a hot
cup of coffee. This is not in my nature. But had I not done
that, he could have still been working there all these past 6
years. It was only because of that action that he was actually
terminated. Law enforcement totally failed me. I am sorry, but
it did. And, actually, there was an investigation--or when I
wrote Senator McCain, he forwarded my letter to the FBI, and
they have some oversight--I don't know the name of who, you
know, looks into their investigations to make sure that the FBI
is doing their job properly. And they just determined that
there was very little they could do because the individual did
not deny it. He admitted it. But he said it was consensual.
Well, it was not consensual. I was raped.
So, rape is a bad crime, and unfortunately it looks like
you are the bad person. But, you know, so that is basically
what happened.
Mr. Lynch. I appreciate your courage in coming forward.
Ms. Kelly. Thank you. Let's just hope it does some good.
Mr. Lynch. I really do.
May I ask you--and you may not be aware of this--did the
FBI disclose if there was a mutual assistance agreement, a
memorandum between them and the registered jurisdiction in this
case?
Ms. Kelly. Repeat that again?
Mr. Lynch. What flag were you flying under in terms of your
ship?
Ms. Kelly. Because of--when I sued civilly, one of the
terms of my statement was that I was not at liberty to disclose
the cruise line.
Mr. Lynch. OK, OK. I am sorry.
Ms. Kelly. No, that is OK. The cruise ship--no, I need to
say that because I want it on record, or the terms of the
settlement.
Mr. Lynch. OK. I can get that from another source.
Ms. Kelly. But you know what? Like I said, no regrets,
because had I not done it----
Mr. Lynch. Oh, absolutely. Undoubtedly----
Ms. Kelly. But it would have been easier to bury my head
and just tuck my head in the sand and say that it did not
happen. That would have totally been the easier way to take.
Mr. Lynch. OK. Mr. Chairman, I know you have questions. I
am going to yield back.
Mr. Shays. Thank the gentleman. At this time the Chair
recognizes Mr. Duncan.
Mr. Duncan. Thank you, Mr. Shays. I have appointments set
up every 15 minutes this afternoon, with more still to come,
before I knew about this hearing. But I did read the testimony
of all of the witnesses, and certainly each of the witnesses
has had a very terrible tragedy occur. I have four children,
and I have always heard the worst thing that can ever happen to
anyone is to outlive one of their children, and I certainly
sympathize with that.
The only thing that I see is that, I mean we should be able
to agree on some steps, like immediate notification of crimes
and things like that. Maybe there should be some sort of
requirement about signs being posted on these ships that would
say something to the effect that while the incidence of crime
on ships is extremely, extremely low, if you are the victim of
a crime, that it is to be reported immediately to the ship's
captain, and immediately reported by them to the authorities on
shore, and there may be some other steps that we can take, but
certainly, we want to do what we can within reason, whatever
that might be. That is all I have, Mr. Chairman. I do not
really have any questions.
Mr. Shays. Thank the gentleman, and I agree with him, I
agree with you and your points. Let me at this time recognize
our counsel and the director of this subcommittee for some
questions, and then I will be having some questions.
Mr. Halloran. Thank you. Mr. Mulvaney, Mr. Leonard, Ms.
Kelly and Ms. Shaffer, as witnesses who actually were on a
cruise, could you describe for the subcommittee what you knew
about security when you got on the ship. Was there written
information provided to you? Were there signs or pamphlets?
What kind of security awareness did you have when the cruise
started as opposed to when it ended?
Mr. Mulvaney. We had no idea of the dangers involved in a
cruise, and it was only enforced after this incident, looking
back on it, that you see the shortfalls within the cruise
industry. And I was under the assumption that it was a safe
environment. You heard one of the Congress Members mention
early on about a party ship. What we actually went on was a
family cruise vacation on a family cruise ship. we didn't go on
a party ship, and----
Mr. Halloran. If as you are sailing and there was an
incident, you saw something wrong, maybe you smelled marijuana
or thought you saw a crime happening, was it clear to whom you
would report that? Was there somebody----
Mr. Mulvaney. No, no. Neither was there any education or
any literature on getting on the cruise ship, which if
something was to occur, also like a man overboard policy or
whatever it may be, who you actually notify or what went on,
that was part of our confusion and problem on the evening our
incident happened. We ended up ringing guest services. We
didn't know who to get in touch with.
Mr. Halloran. Mr. Leonard.
Mr. Leonard. We had no idea about specific security issues.
We were lulled into believing that this was really secure, as
is evidenced by the fact that we never took jewelry or anything
valuable when we went on a trip to Europe or anywhere else. So
the jewelry that my wife took, she took because we had been
assured there would be a safe in the room, this was a secure
ship. I brought my tux because we were lulled into this idea,
seduced into this idea there would be formal nights and there
would be fun, and everything would be secure. Then, lo and
behold, there was no safe, although the ship was completely
refurbished a couple of months in 2004 before we got on it. It
had been the Nordic Princess, then it became the Empress of the
Seas. So at least 30 to 40 percent of the ship, according to
the Guest Manager, Luis Martins, didn't have safes, and so it
was a question then of going up for a half an hour at least to
Guest Security, waiting in a line to put anything into the
safe, and then waiting for another half an hour to take
anything out of the safe, and, frankly, we didn't get on the
ship in order to be waiting on lines to put things here and
there.
So we were very secure when after the burglary we reported
it, and then 6 hours later everything started to fall apart.
They could not secure the room and investigate for 6 hours.
Then when the Secretary Officer, Mr. MacLaughlin, came in,
he said that there should have been things done differently.
Mr. Halloran. But before the robbery, was it clear who
Security was on the ship? Could you----
Mr. Leonard. No, no, absolutely not. I guess it is supposed
to be even after September 11th obscure so that terrorists are
not aware of how they might be surveilled, but I didn't notice
anything. The only place that I ever had a sense that there
might have been some big, large guys looking, was in the
casino. Other than that, I never had a sense that there was
anything. It was all very unobtrusive. There was no sign
anywhere. There was nothing in the cruise documents, although
we are now absolutely convinced that there should be a sign on
every cruise ship, ``Enter at your own risk,'' and that AAA and
all other bookers should provide information that you should be
aware that a ship is not completely secure, and you can be
robbed or raped or brutalized, and that you might not have any
recourse because the company has protected itself by requiring
you to sue them in Miami, FL or in their headquarters, which
makes suing rather expensive.
Mr. Halloran. Ms. Kelly.
Ms. Kelly. Thank you for asking that question. I didn't get
a real strong sense of security. They have you sign all these
disclaimers when you get on. I am like, what the heck? I
thought, well, we are going to have some fun here. But, you
know, even the paperwork that they have you sign is very
intimidating.
I remember something about seeing something about a doctor
when I got to the room. I don't remember if it was something
posted or if I read it. My particular incident, when it
happened, it was the night before, and then when I woke up that
next morning, I was so traumatized, if I could have crawled
underneath the carpet, so help me, God, I would have. And I was
afraid for my own safety. So even though I had read or saw
somewhere that there was a doctor on board, I would be damned
if I was going to go to him.
So, in retrospect, even though I didn't report it on the
cruise line, I am glad I didn't. I think I did right. My
instincts served me right by just getting off there, and
everything in my instinct said ``Get off and get out of there
in one piece,'' so that is what happened.
Mr. Halloran. Thank you.
Ms. Shaffer.
Ms. Shaffer. I really can't remember. That wasn't my
complaint, about the lack of security. It was the way it is
handled, their procedures of how they handle, and how they
cover up, and how they listen to you to find the loopholes to
cover up what happened so that they continue to look good.
Mr. Shays. I am not clear by your response. They look for
ways to?
Ms. Shaffer. They look for ways to weasel out of taking
responsibility for helping solve the crime.
Mr. Shays. Can you give me an example of what you mean?
Ms. Shaffer. Well, for instance, when I took my daughter 3
days in a row, asking for an examination, a rape examination,
and the doctor would just sit and stare at me, and sit and
stare, and stare, and stare, and stare, and never anything--he
said to me that I was traumatizing my daughter.
Mr. Shays. Right. Let me ask you this. Your daughter came
in to see the doctor, but she was requesting that she not be
examined?
Ms. Shaffer. No, she wasn't requesting. She was just in
denial that she had been raped. She was----
Mr. Shays. Just so that I can see the scene.
Ms. Shaffer. She did not refuse to be examined.
Mr. Shays. Was your daughter with you when you went in?
Ms. Shaffer. She was with me.
Mr. Shays. Right, that is what I thought, but--so she was
neither saying yes or no. She was just traumatized.
Ms. Shaffer. She was just saying no, she hadn't been raped,
that nothing had happened. And she was crying, but she was
willing to be examined.
Mr. Shays. OK. And he or she chose not to----
Ms. Shaffer. He chose not to.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Mr. Halloran. Mr. Pham, Mr. Carver, in sort of different
circumstances, but if you could describe in a little more
detail, the problems with getting information from the company
about, in the case of your daughter and your parents? In a
sense they had lost precious cargo you had put on those ships.
What was the explanation that was given as to where your loved
ones were?
Mr. Carver. When we finally got to them, they had disposed
of her personal items. If you look at their regulations they
say they are to keep items for 3 months. We are talking to them
in 3 weeks. We asked up front was there any video of Merrian,
and the answer was, ``We only keep them for 2 or 3 weeks, and
you got here too late.''
Mr. Halloran. Excuse me. I just want to be clear on that.
They actually had videos. They knew your daughter was missing.
They had videos and they destroyed the videos?
Mr. Carver. Well, let me finish the story. In fact, that is
what happened. They denied to us that they had videos, and they
said they only keep them 2 or 3 weeks and we got there too
late. We sent somebody on the ship on November 4th, a
detective. They said the same thing. There was no review of the
video concerning Merrian, and we only keep them 2 or 3 weeks.
But if you look at the documents in my supplemental statements,
on their stationery, on September 23rd, Security is reviewing
the videos. And if we look at documents written that they wrote
on April 9th, the videos are not destroyed in 2 or 3 weeks,
they are on a 30-day cycle. So in other words, on the 26th day
of a 30-day cycle, they were looking at the videos.
Mr. Shays. Let me ask you this. Did they say any of this in
writing?
Mr. Carver. It is all in writing.
Mr. Shays. So their own information----
Mr. Carver. Yes. We have their own internal documents. They
are sitting on the table over here, where they are reviewing
the videos, which they said they did not review, and it is all
documented. Very discouraging. And, of course, those documents
which we have brought, they are talking to the steward. Three
times he is talked to by the head of the hotel, saying, ``Do
not discuss this with anybody. It is a serious problem.'' And
he is reporting that to the management in Miami, FL.
Well, for us to finally get to that individual took us
until January 16th to get his testimony, only after we had gone
to court, gotten court orders, because they were clearly
setting up in the 3rd week in September, the cover over, and
they also discussed how they are disposing of her items. Now,
why would you dispose of items, a brown manila envelope,
putting them maybe in lost and found--they don't know what they
did with it--why would you destroy it? They knew who the
passenger was.
Mr. Halloran. So you first contacted the company at what
level?
Mr. Carver. Well, we called Miami. Then a representative of
risk management came back to us the third week in September.
Mr. Halloran. And then what, and then the lawyers got
involved? Because Mr. Leonard describes another kind of series
of people and offices he heard from. Did you hear from a number
of people in the chain?
Mr. Carver. Well, we basically were talking to a woman
named Katie with risk management. She was the go-between,
literally telling us lies for the whole time. She was the one
person that everybody zeroed into. When detectives went to her
in October, said, ``Was there any incident on this ship that
the steward have reported?'' She said, ``No, absolutely none.''
There is a copy of a letter that I wrote to the board of
directors giving her quote to our detective. They wouldn't even
tell us the name of the steward. But she was clearly, I can
only say, lying to them, because in fact, they had talked to
them. There had been a hearing on the ship. They had fired the
supervisor for gross dereliction of duties, and she is
pretending that nothing happened.
In a report to the FBI, dated September 30th, she makes a
statement, ``There was no Oscar, Oscar, Oscar emergency on the
ship.'' Well, there had been. They lost a passenger. They had
had meetings, and yet that is what she is reporting to the FBI.
It is my understanding, to write a misleading statement to the
FBI is illegal, to deceive them. That, in and of itself is a
crime.
Mr. Halloran. It is called obstruction of justice in many
places.
Mr. Carver. That is what I said in my report.
Mr. Halloran. Mr. Pham, what was your experience?
Mr. Pham. Well, I have very little to say, because after
the ship came back and they washed it, and they loaded the next
group of passengers and they said. Since then we heard from
them only once. The FBI concluded the investigation the end of
August, supposedly couldn't find any foul play. We're still
working on getting the detail of that investigation, but pretty
much, you know, I don't think Carnival even knew we were there.
I don't think they know who we are. I don't think that they
know they have two passengers that left with them, paid the
full fare, never came back, I don't think so.
The one time I finally got through one time to the office
of the president of the Carnival Cruise Lines in Miami and
talked to the Customer Service Manager from the Office of the
President, and after 2 days, and she said, ``Well, let me check
with Legal before I can talk to you,'' and she got back, and
now I learned a new term. In the dictionary it is called
``lawyer up.'' Because that is exactly all she cared for when
she called me back, to say that, ``Mr. Pham, we couldn't tell
you what to do. We couldn't tell you what happened. Very rare.
This never happened before.'' Let me tell you, it happened in
December 2004. Somebody disappeared on one of their ship. And
they could have told me, ``Well, this is what you should do
next,'' and so on. They refused to acknowledge we were there.
You know what? Not a lot of people have the means to go
after these cruise lines. My parents lost. They worked very
hard for their money, and it is not fair for the State--and for
all of us just to find out the truth, we have to hire an
attorney, we have to pay all of that money to find out what
happened to my mother and my father? That is not the America
that we came to that we learned, and so that is all I have.
Mr. Shays. Let me just use your comment as just a matter
that I want to state for the public record. When we started
this investigation because of George Smith and Ms. Hagel Smith,
we wanted to know what had happened and how they were treated.
And in the course of doing that, Mr. Carver came to our first
hearing, and I felt his story was beyond my comprehension,
basically a father who has to spend money to find out what
happened to his daughter. And all along the way there were
breakdowns. It wasn't that the steward didn't do his or her
job. Was it a man or woman, the steward, do yo know?
Mr. Carver. He was a man.
Mr. Shays. Did his job, and he reported it to a supervisor.
And then we are being told, well, basically, that was a
mistake, and he was let go, a serious mistake. You would think
at that moment in time, there would be just absolute full
cooperation. You would think almost that the head of the
company would come on bended knee to you, Mr. Carver, and say,
``Whatever happened to your daughter, we apologize. Now, how
can we cooperate so that you don't go through any more pain?''
Even in fact, obviously, Mr. Carver, if your daughter had
committed suicide, but that is irrelevant to your being able to
get the facts you need.
So the point I want to make to all of you is, one, we want
to help each of you in the cases where it is still outstanding,
get all the information. We want to ensure that the cruise line
fully and completely cooperates. Their failure to cooperate
with you is a message to this subcommittee that they have
things to hide, which only means that we will be more vigorous
in pursuing this investigation. Their willingness to cooperate
with you and with this subcommittee means that we can work
together and solve whatever problems may exist.
So, one, I would want you to know that this subcommittee is
asking publicly all the ships involved and the cruise lines
involved to fully, completely, without hesitation, without any
reluctance, cooperate and ease your pain, and help you. But
also in the process they will help themselves.
Mr. Pham, the implication that we have received and read
was that your mom and dad committed suicide, that their shoes
were strategically placed, and it appeared like they just
jumped overboard. There is nothing that you have told me that
would indicate they would have any reason to, particularly at
an event like that event. No note saying goodbye.
Mr. Pham. As a matter of fact, I was in California a month
ago to open--finally, we got the death certificate. I filed a
petition with the Superior Court of Orange County, CA, and I
got 5 percent chance that a judge would approve. And instead of
waiting for 5 years, I finally got the death certificate and
opened the safe deposit a month ago, and everything,
everything--and not only that, but----
Mr. Shays. Finish everything, everything, what?
Mr. Pham. Everything was so normal, and they lived their
lives, and we have so many unfinished--Mom and Dad had so much
unfinished business. One thing I didn't verbally mention
earlier, but it is in the record, that last November my parents
left--when we left our mother land, our Vietnam, for 30 years,
and it took them 30 years to finally have enough closure,
enough closure, wanting to go back to Vietnam. I travel there a
lot of times for charity work and business, and finally, in
December 2004, Mom and Dad said--I asked them again, I said,
``Mom, Dad, are you ready?'' And I could tell in their voice
that, yes, I am going with you next time.
Since then, 2 days before Mom and Dad boarded the flight to
Chicago for their vacation, and Mom was on the phone with me
and worried about some dumb thing, that, you know, when we
arrive in Saigon in November, you know, if the car is big
enough for our luggage. For them, waiting that long and go back
and see their relatives, that is something that they would not
want to leave this Earth before doing that.
And I had the honor and privilege, bringing my parents
back, which had never happened to me. It is something that I
will never forget the rest of my life. You know, nine
grandchildren, and on top of that, after I opened the safe
deposit box a month ago and saw everything was normal, the last
time my father went in that safe deposit box was in December
2004, so nothing planned. I forgot--I didn't forget. It is in
the record also--that we have a grandfather--we left our
country without anything, and so family means a lot to us. My
grandfather is 94-years-old. He is laying in bed now in a
nursing home. He couldn't move. He couldn't speak. And I have
no idea what is going through his mind about what happened to
his children that never came back to him. Mom and Dad the only
people that took care of my grandfather, and now they
disappeared, they are gone. And none of us live in California.
You know, we have so many things going for us that, you
know.
Mr. Shays. So the bottom line to this is there was no
indication earlier on, no previous attempts to end life.
Mr. Pham. You know what? If Mom and Dad did that--and they
are not that type--that would be the cruelest thing, to go on a
cruise, a mother's day present, with your daughter and your
granddaughter and left them. You know, my parents, we--I was
waiting for somebody to----
Mr. Shays. Let me just say you have the opportunity to say
whatever you want. I was thinking of your imagery of having to
be in the open sea with your parents leaving Vietnam and how
dangerous that was, and the incredible, unbelievable
circumstance that finds you on the water again, where your
parents are now missing, and the way you appear to be treated.
I just want to say to you that we will ask whatever question we
need to ask to give you an opportunity to say what needs to be
put on this congressional record under oath, under oath.
Mr. Pham. Well, Mom and Dad look over us all the time, and
I know they're looking over me today, and since they left, and
so we have access to some information that's very important,
I'm sure, to the cruise line, to everybody and to us, that the
event happening immediately after the discovery of my parents'
disappearance. And so, there's no way I could sit here, or
anyone in this room could sit here, with the exception of the
representative from the companies that operate these cruise
lines, to say that what kind of procedures you have in place,
and did you follow those procedures, and why didn't you?
Because, see, there's no way for us to find out what happened
to Mom and Dad if they goof from the very next second after
they were told disappear. And I don't know if they goof on
purpose, intentionally, unintentionally. We don't know. And
maybe 1 day, justice can be done to our family, where we can
sit face to face across and get the truth. And we've heard that
word, the truth, over and over and over from that side and from
this side. We want to know the truth. We can't change anything
unless we know the truth.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Mr. Carver, let me just put on the record, because it will
be stated outside this hearing, your daughter evidently had
tried to end her life at a previous time?
Mr. Carver. Going back several years ago after divorce
and--one time.
Mr. Shays. So it is not your issue of whether or not she
chose to end her life, or in fact, did, it is the issue that
once she was determined missing, you and your family should
have been notified immediately, and there should have been an
effort first to find her, whether or not she had chosen to, if
that was the case. So I think it is pretty much on the record.
It is just an amazing story, both of your stories are amazing.
Mr. Lynch, would you like some questions?
Mr. Lynch. Yes.
Mr. Shays. Let me give you time to ask questions.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to ask all of you. I have talked with folks
that have been in this situation, and none of them approach the
pain and the experiences that I hear about today from all of
you, but the nub of this problem is there is no accountability,
there is no liability. The incentives for the cruise line to
hide information and to conceal information, and to not report,
it is a financial incentive for them to do that, because if
people found out, it would hurt their business. So there is a
disincentive for reporting. There is a gap here. The FBI is not
required, in a formal sense, to keep track of every single--
even though safety of life at sea gives jurisdiction, and the
maritime regs allow the FBI to exercise jurisdiction, the
strength of that jurisdiction and their authority often depends
upon the memorandum of agreement, the mutual assistance
agreement with the individual country whose flag is being flown
by that cruise ship.
It seems to me that at the very beginning, and I want to
hear your own thoughts on this, but at the very beginning we
need to have someone, someone needs to be responsible for
reporting these incidents, and there have to be grave
consequences, grave consequences, from the captain of the ship
to the operator. There has to be grave consequences when an
incident occurs and it is not fully reported to begin with.
In talking with other people, and trying to create this
accountability, they have suggested different things to me, and
I want to hear your input on it. Some have suggested that
because there was no U.S. law enforcement on a ship, that there
was really no accountability for a U.S. citizen. And people
were saying to me, we should have at least one officer on a
ship. If they are calling on a port in the United States of
America, there should be a U.S. law enforcement person on that
ship.
Other people have said that when a ship returns and there
is a passenger missing, there should be immediate removal of
that captain subject to the investigation, and that would be a
serious consequence to the cruise ship line in having their
captain removed. Others have suggested, in taking children--and
I know a number of incidents have occurred with children--is
putting actual tracking devices on passengers when they come on
the ship, so that in the event that someone does go overboard,
and a couple of witnesses have said, we don't know if they made
a mistake or whether there was some deliberate concealment here
of the incident, and then they were embarrassed to go back and
admit they had made a mistake.
Also, I have heard in a similar case with some of the
witnesses here about these confidentiality agreements, and do
we simply, in part of our response say, where someone has gone
missing, there shall be no settlement that contains a
confidentiality agreement that puts a gag on innocent American
citizens from reporting a horrible wrong that has been done to
them.
Again, going back to the reporting, make sure that it is
mandatory, that it is reliable, and that people who are in your
circumstance, my sisters, I have five sisters. They take
cruises all the time with their kids. They are nuts about it.
But in doing something like that with your family, there should
be a report card, a report card of the ship line that you are
traveling with, so that you can--you know, they have it on the
Internet quite a bit now, different companies, a score card, a
consumer report on incidents and people who have been--well,
people who are very happy with the service they received,
versus people who are dreadfully disappointed with the way they
had been treated as a customer, and that is another mandatory,
sort of shining a spotlight, an open air type reporting
requirement that could be available to people.
I want to hear your thoughts in terms of any of those ideas
that you think may be warranted, Mr. Carver?
Mr. Carver. Well, we've proposed many items here, but there
is a simple solution that can solve the cruise line problem
tomorrow. There's something called a board of directors of that
cruise line, and let's take the case of Royal Caribbean. They
are under the New York Stock Exchange Rules. They have a
fiduciary responsibility, in my opinion--I'm not a lawyer--to
protect the safety of the members of the crew.
Now, in the case of Merrian, there's a letter sitting over
there. I wrote the board of directors. I gave them the
depositions. I proved the cover-up. Now, when you're on the New
York Stock Exchange, after Enron, I don't think you can clearly
ignore those issues. You can't just push it down to somebody in
risk management and say, ``Hey, take care of Carver.'' You have
a fiduciary responsibility for the safety of those passengers,
as I see it as a non-lawyer.
Now, they could make changes immediately, and if in fact,
they realize that they have that fiduciary responsibility, they
might act a little bit quicker. They might take some steps they
haven't taken. There's a company called Enron that took a lot
of time to cover up the books, and the board said, ``We didn't
know what was happening.'' I think the accounting rules have
changed. I'm not sure you can do that anymore.
Mr. Pham. You know, I found something very interesting a
couple days ago. I went to the State Department travel Web
site, travel warning. And there's a couple warnings there I bet
you a lot of people in this room wouldn't know. One is the
spring break coming up in the Bahamas area, and one is the
spring break coming up in Mexico. You know, that's the duty of
the State Department.
Now, why did I look up? Because after my parents'
disappearance, I worked a lot with the Bureau of Consular
Affairs, try to get presumption of death on the high seas
document from the State Department to help us with the death
certificate issues. But, you know, what's the difference? If
these ships leave our port, bring U.S. citizens into
international waters, to other shores and things of that--and
these incidents happen on these ships. And if they don't report
it, if they don't have to report it, if nobody monitor it, they
don't have a--keep the statistics--they don't have to do all
those things. Why there's an exemption there? We don't
understand. So maybe you can take that into consideration.
Thank you.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, sir.
Ms. Shaffer.
Ms. Shaffer. Well, I would just like putting up a big sign
when you enter the ship, saying, ``Enter at your own risk.'' I
think they're very dangerous. I think the statistics that they
have are bogus, and they don't hold up. And it's very
dangerous.
What I would like to see is that the public, the general
public becomes aware of the dangers, and when you take a trip
aboard a cruise, that you're informed of the dangers, and that
there's regulations put on children, curfews. Children should
not be being served. My daughter was 18 when we were on the
ship, and she was getting drunk every night in the disco. She
was being served alcohol. So when I was on the cruise, I felt
perfectly safe, and so I had no idea of the risks or the
dangers, or this would not have happened. I am not a liberal
mom. I'm a very conservative mom, and I pay close attention to
my children, and this should have never happened. I just
blinked my eye, and there it is.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you.
Ms. Kelly.
Ms. Kelly. Yes, I would like to add a couple things. No. 1,
I think that idea of a microchip is just outstanding, just
personally. I mean I know this is an outrageous statement, and
you're probably going to think it's outrageous, but I mean,
there could feasibly be a serial killer on one of these ships.
Because they're not reporting to one main data base, and when
somebody gets terminated, like in my case, and they just go
back to work for another cruise line, I mean you could have a
very serious criminal on one of these cruise ships. So anyway,
I just really like the idea of the microchip because I just
think that's a good idea as a tracking device.
Also, the U.S. Marshals, just to give you a little bit of
background, I have 12 years in banking, and when I was a
teller, and I know this sounds simple, but we had these secret
shoppers. So when I waited on somebody I didn't know if they
were a secret shopper and they were checking me to see if I was
doing my job, or if it was just a regular customer. I think by
having U.S. Marshals on those ships, even if it's random, I
think it would be of great importance because those bartenders,
those--I don't know how many, 52, or how many other bartenders
are on the ship, they wouldn't know if they were, you know,
serving a U.S. Marshal or if they were serving a Janet Kelly.
So I just think that would be huge. I think it would just
totally raise the accountability. I just think it would be
awesome. So that's just my thoughts.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Ms. Kelly.
Mr. Leonard.
Mr. Leonard. I see that there are really two broad kinds of
questions or issues. One concerns cruise line safety and the
company's treatment of guests on the one hand and the threat of
terrorism on the other. Now, I think to some extent both would
be somewhat lessened as a problem if there was an agency to
which the Congress directed the companies to provide all
documented cases of crime which could then be made available to
the general population through a Web site or which travel
agents would be aware of.
Second, this would obviously require some sort of change in
Federal law, because to some extent it seems the lack of
accountability is part of the reason why these things take
place, and that lack of accountability seems to be a byproduct
of either the companies thumbing their noses at Federal law, or
simply that there is a legal twilight zone where they can pick
and choose what laws they will follow.
Part of public disclosure would be to make sure that
passengers who have a documented case of a crime on shipboard
get a copy of their report and the security officer's report,
who investigates. Now, the business about the key cards is, I
think, rather crucial. When my wife and I were in France in the
summer of 2001, we noticed virtually everywhere we were, when
you gave a waiter a credit card, he had a little machine, and
he ran the card through it right in front of you, gave the
receipt, which you signed, and your own receipt, right there
and then, so that on ships that kind of technology, which is
well proven, should be used so your credit card is never out of
your hands when you use it on the ship. Remember, on a ship you
are not in a hotel. You just cannot walk away and go down the
street.
Now, insofar as terrorism is concerned, I think there has
to be, obviously, some kind of tightening up concerning
security, and this is at the larger level, the macro level, but
also at the micro level. If you can get into somebody's cabin
because of a key card being played with, then you cannot only
steal property and personal identities, you can also place
contraband inside that cabin, which might go off, as it lands
in Bayonne, NJ in the Port of New York, or it is smuggled into
the country by some unwitting guest on a ship because he or she
doesn't even know there's something in his luggage. So the
whole question of control of the key cards and making sure that
they are the least likely way to lose your security, that
anybody can somehow get into your cabin, has to be ensured. And
there is no reason why every bit of information to potential
thieves and others is on these key cards, telling them when
you're going to dine, so if you know when somebody is going to
go and eat, you can know exactly when the person is not going
to be in the cabin.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Leonard.
Mr. Mulvaney.
Mr. Mulvaney. I like the sea marshal idea, and we could
charge the passengers for creating employment. But I think the
real problem lies with the DOHSA law, and that means
accountability of the ships. Some of the current laws have no
incentive whatsoever to reform or to do anything----
Mr. Shays. Mr. Mulvaney, talk a little slower. Given that
he is from Boston, he understands you really well.
Mr. Lynch. I could translate for you, Mr. Mulvaney.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Mulvaney. I will go back to the start. The sea marshal
thing I like, and some of the other good ideas, but I think the
problem lies with the DOHSA law itself. The DOHSA law affords
the cruise industry too much blanket coverage. If you change
this the ships have an incentive themselves to enforce certain
laws on the ships and make sure that they no longer have that
protection. Their insurance premiums naturally will rise. You
know what I'm saying? But they will certainly have a fear of
going out and doing anything, that if it ends up in U.S. court,
they will be held responsible.
As far as somebody on board the ship needs to be in charge.
If we have the captain in charge, the captain works for the
cruise company. We're going to have the fox minding the hen
house. He's there to make a profit for the ship. In Mr.
O'Brien's specific incident, you had marked everywhere, ``No
alcohol served to minors.'' You had it on the ship's contract,
no alcohol. It is the law here in the United States, no
alcohol. Yet the ship's bartenders serve minors alcohol. We've
heard that statement from another guest here today also.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. We have two more panels, but I do want to just
ask a few more questions, and I thank you for your patience.
Ms. Kelly, I am going to ask you some questions that I do
not know the answers to. I am not trying to prove your point or
disprove your point, but I do want to understand. I don't want
to assume.
Ms. Kelly. OK.
Mr. Shays. You say that you were drugged. Was that
documented that you were drugged, or you believe you were
drugged?
Ms. Kelly. OK, both. Well, no. I tried to document it. I
went, and when I reported it to the hospital, I mean, it was a
9-hour emergency room.
Mr. Shays. Talk a little slower.
Ms. Kelly. OK. It was a 9-hour emergency room visit. It was
very traumatic.
Mr. Shays. And this was right after you got off the ship?
Ms. Kelly. No. When I got off the ship, I got in a cab, I
went to the airport. And there, I think the realization of
everything that had happened, plus the effects of the drug, I
was very sick, I was very traumatized, so I was hysterical, if
you will.
Mr. Shays. Were you with other family members?
Ms. Kelly. Yes, I didn't have any family members, and I
didn't really have any close, close friends. They were just
neighbors and acquaintances. So anyway, what I did is I tried
to contact my counselor, because I had been seeing a counselor
from when we had lost our daughter.
Mr. Shays. Yes.
Ms. Kelly. But I couldn't reach her, and who I ended up
reaching was my best friend from sixth grade, and she said,
``Janet, get on an airplane.'' I told her what happened. I'm
crying, sobbing. If I would see somebody in an airport terminal
like myself, I would have been taking their hand and taken them
to an authority. But unfortunately, nothing was done at that
point, because there I was on safe ground.
Mr. Shays. But you can describe that you were somewhat in a
fog as this----
Ms. Kelly. I know I was drugged. Mr. Shays, I know I was
drugged, for a number of reasons. No. 1, I only had two drinks.
Mr. Shays. Was there anyone else that was with you that saw
you being taken away?
Ms. Kelly. No. But you know what? Interestingly enough,
after I was drugged and I came back--and what happened was,
this is all right before dinner. Like I said, I'm not a heavy
drinker. I came back to my cabin, and it's weird how it is when
you're drugged, but it's kind of like you're in a dream state.
That's the best way I can describe it. I made my way back to my
cabin, and I passed out face forward on the bottom bunk, wasn't
even my bunk, and I was just out cold.
But to answer your question, I know I was drugged because
I've read the effects of the drug, and I was very sick for 3
days after. I probably only had one meal. I had severe
diarrhea. I know I was drugged. There's just no doubt in my
mind.
Mr. Shays. I hear you. It just helps if it can be
documented.
Ms. Kelly. Exactly right, exactly right. No, I understand
that.
I'm sorry. What was the rest of your question?
Mr. Shays. But you basically told me that----
Ms. Kelly. Oh, yes.
Mr. Shays. And there was no proof of semen or anything like
that?
Ms. Kelly. Well, you know what? Here's the thing. If they
had it, they just dismissed it because of the fact that they
said--see, he admitted it. As a matter of fact----
Mr. Shays. Oh, he did admit it.
Ms. Kelly. The bartender admitted it, and he actually said,
``Did I hurt her?'' This was the morning after. The girl I was
with, one of the gals I was with, went and approached him.
Mr. Shays. So what he admitted to was breaking company
policy, but he did not--this was an employee of the--so company
policy is that you don't interact with----
Ms. Kelly. Oh, no.
Mr. Shays. So he's admitting to breaking company policy,
Ms. Kelly. Correct.
Mr. Shays. So grounds for dismissal, but he is not
admitting that there was a rape that took place, obviously.
Ms. Kelly. What he says, and what the FBI said, is that he
said it was consensual. He doesn't deny that we had
intercourse.
Mr. Shays. Boy, that would drive me crazy.
Ms. Kelly. So the thing that makes me crazy about the whole
thing is if it would have happened here, I mean, there would
have been repercussions. I mean he would have been prosecuted.
I would have made sure of it. But because of how--anyway, to
answer your question though about the hospital, I had called a
rape counselor, which I'm glad I did it because she told me
what to do, and she guided me. When I went to the hospital I
was educated on rape. I was like, OK, you have to take my
blood, and you have to hurry up, and there's people having
heart attacks and all this other stuff going on.
Mr. Shays. May I ask you, well, the bottom line is you
experienced what evidently a lot of college students
experience.
Ms. Kelly. Correct.
Mr. Shays. But you were older than a college student.
Ms. Kelly. But you know what? The unfortunate thing is that
drug, it leaves your blood system right away, and that's why
they use it, OK. And it would have shown up in the urine, and
for some reason the hospital lost my urine sample. Had they had
that, I would have had proof, and so it is very unfortunate.
But I did it. I told them that they had to take my urine, they
had to take blood. I mean I totally knew what I was doing.
Mr. Shays. You didn't have an adviser or anyone with you?
Ms. Kelly. An adviser?
Mr. Shays. You didn't have anyone with you when you went to
the hospital?
Ms. Kelly. You know what? I had a co-worker that actually
grabbed me and said, ``Let's go.''
Mr. Shays. She took you, but she was not----
Ms. Kelly. Yes. And then I had a call. My husband, who had
just had open heart, and here I had to tell him what happened,
just----
Mr. Shays. Takes a lot of courage. Thank you.
Mr. Leonard, I don't have many questions for you because
you pretty much documented everything you went through. What
you document most, from my standpoint, is that you would not
have shown up in crime statistics, which is one of the problems
that I have. I don't have much faith in the crime statistics.
So I just want you to know why I don't have questions for
you. In part it was your professor-like thoroughness and
assistance to speak even longer than I wanted, but you covered
the territory.
Mr. Leonard. Well, frankly, I felt I had to because this
would the first and last time. I'm not planning to go on any--
--
Mr. Shays. What pleases me most is it's the first time you
smiled all day today too. [Laughter.]
Because I mean, one of the things that you will go to the
funny farm with the incredible aggravation you have had to go
through, because, frankly, the crime was committed. All they
had to do acknowledge the crime was committed. They couldn't
probably solve the crime. You had a right to expect them to
make a good faith effort. So all they did basically was stiff-
arm you and add to your misery, when in the end, taking the
other tack would have maybe gotten you back as a customer
because you would have basically said, ``You know what? There
was a screw-up and so on, but thank you for treating me with
respect,'' and you obviously were not treated with respect, and
I am sorry about that, obviously.
Mr. Leonard. Well, ordinarily one doesn't----
Mr. Shays. Put the mic down a little bit so I hear you.
Mr. Leonard. Ordinarily one doesn't generalize from one
specific anecdote.
Mr. Shays. Ms. Kelly, would you help him out because you
are really good at this. OK.
Mr. Leonard. Thank you. Ordinarily one doesn't generalize
from one specific example, but our case of this theft is a kind
of classic example of everything being done wrong, and the
refusal of the multibillion dollar corporation to simply admit
that there might have been some responsibility on the part of
the ship company, the personnel, and that the company accepts
the possibility that a mistake might have been made. We're not
talking about the kind of situations that have been presented
here. This is horrifying. I mean this was simply a relatively
small grand larceny of our property, but in the grand scheme of
things, for a multibillion dollar corporation this is not even
small potatoes.
For them to go out of their way to deny not only to me, but
to the Federal Maritime Commission, that we even reported the
crime on the ship, and we faxed this person, Betty Taillefer,
the signed statement--which by the way, when you look at it,
because you have a copy of it, at the end of their own form
they have ``retain for 1 year.'' So the probability is that
this is a fairly common kind of experience, and they jettison
this stuff.
Mr. Shays. I can understand in one respect that if the FBI
doesn't want to investigate a crime committed, a certain dollar
amount, the fact that the crime took place needs to be
documented in all thefts. The cruise industry likes to compare
themselves to towns, and if that is the case, when $100 is
stolen, it is a crime, and it is reported and there is this
statistic. And whether it is $100, $1,000, $5,000, $6,000,
$10,000, it all needs to be reported.
Mr. Mulvaney, the bottom line is you were on board the
ship; is this correct?
Mr. Mulvaney. Yes, that's correct.
Mr. Shays. And your experience was, one, you did not know
who to contact right away, correct?
Mr. Mulvaney. Correct.
Mr. Shays. There is no phones periodically that say, ``If
emergency, call this number?''
Mr. Mulvaney. No. When you first get on the ship the first
day, they do what they call a muster station, where they bring
everybody down to the deck where the lifeboats is, and they
explain to everybody at that point in time what goes on in the
event of a fire on the ship or if you have to abandon ship on
the lifeboats.
Mr. Shays. I mean if you are in a building and there is a
fire, you can pull the fire alarm, a warning, and people can
get out. If you are on a bus, you are on a subway, you are on a
train, the bottom line is you have something to pull, you know
where to go to stop the bus or train or whatever. On a boat----
Mr. Mulvaney. There is a fire alarm system on the boat.
Mr. Shays. Fire alarm, yes. But if they have a fire alarm
there is no system that would enable you--if you saw someone go
overboard--I was just thinking if I was just there and I saw
someone overboard, I wouldn't know where to run to, but I have
never been on board a ship. So I am wanting to know if--my
parents have been on many and love cruising--but what I am
asking is, there was nothing that you were made aware of that
if someone was overboard, you contact this person immediately,
and then they would hopefully have a better chance of locating
that person. They don't have such a----
Mr. Mulvaney. No, there was no procedure for the passengers
set in place, nor do I think there was any procedure for the
staff of the cruise line in place after the incident happened
because they seemed somewhat confused about the issue also.
Mr. Shays. We have been joined by Mr. Mica. Mr. Mica, I am
going to ask just two more questions, but do you have questions
you would like to ask as well?
Mr. Mica. Yes.
Mr. Shays. It doesn't have to be quick.
Let me go to Mr. Mica first, and then we will just close
up.
Mr. Mica, you have the floor as long as you would like.
Mr. Mica. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am a member of the
full committee, but not the subcommittee.
Mr. Shays. You are welcome and we appreciate you being
here.
Mr. Mica. But as you know, Mr. Chairman, I represent the
State of Florida, and I came in a little bit late, didn't have
a pleasant experience with my travel, even though I am chairman
of the Aviation Subcommittee. [Laughter.]
But that is a matter for another hearing. [Laughter.]
Just one of my concerns. There have been some serious
incidents reported here, and tragedies reported, and it is a
slow news day, and they are picked up. I woke up this morning
in Florida, highly recommend it if you want to travel
someplace, absolutely gorgeous. But woke up this morning and
turned on the news, and almost every channel, the cruise
industry. I was very concerned. I am concerned about the
welfare of people who have had some sort of a problem with a
cruise experience, and I appreciate this hearing paying
attention to any of those problems, and maybe some improvements
that may be necessary in reporting or whatever. But coming from
the State of Florida, it is one of our biggest industries. We
have millions and millions of people, hundreds of thousands of
jobs.
And I don't think people should leave the hearing and think
that the cruise industry is not concerned, and in some way the
cruise industry or your experience is typical of the experience
that millions and millions of people have had in cruises. There
are unfortunate incidences. We have a summer place up in the
mountains, and people go camping. We have had people killed,
missing, abducted, raped, attacked in camping incidents, most
of it national park service area that is patrolled by national
park folks. I also don't represent Disney, used to when I was
in the State legislature. And we have had incidents at all of
our theme parks and the surrounding areas and attractions,
unfortunately, some of them even worse than what has been
described here.
Again, my concern is that this hearing doesn't project the
image that this is something that occurs every day, or the
industry is not concerned about, again, some of the problems
that have been raised. The fact is that, again, we have lower
percentages of incidents of any of the types of activity or
incidents that you have described today here in the general
population. Is that not correct? Maybe we will go down----
Mr. Mulvaney. Like you, Mr. Mica, I am from the same area
of Florida, and I visited on many occasions Disneyland,
Universal Studios, all the theme parks and done everything
else, and the security in place in all these standard land-
based locations is far greater and far exceeds anything which
is----
Mr. Mica. I would have to disagree with you. I see it every
day. The only time I have seen the security that tight would be
when we had the President there a couple of weeks ago. Most of
these places hire part-time people or people who don't have a
great deal of law enforcement. Most of them are not taking the
hotel on the high seas, in international waters subject to
various laws, so I would have to disagree with that.
Mr. Leonard.
Mr. Leonard. In the absence of reliable statistics, how can
you be so certain that it isn't far higher than what the cruise
lines report when they wish to report it. We don't have any
idea. And when a grand larceny is not reported to any law
enforcement agency, I start to wonder what happens to smaller
crimes.
Mr. Mica. Well, we do have, 305 crimes have been reported
in the high seas over the past 5 years. Do you think it is
necessary that we have some sort of official document for crime
reporting?
Mr. Leonard. Yes, precisely.
Mr. Mica. On each cruise ship?
Mr. Leonard. On each cruise ship, reported to an agency.
Mr. Mica. I travel quite a bit. I have cruised quite a bit.
I have never seen an industry that solicits more comments from
their customers or passengers or clients than the cruise
industry, none. In fact, they do everything but they harass you
to get some response.
Mr. Leonard. What's the problem with reporting? If there is
no problem, then that would show up----
Mr. Mica. So you are suggesting a uniform, a question--I am
looking for something positive that we could do with the
industry, but that, of course, wouldn't fit into any official
reporting document. It would just be a volunteer thing. Do you
think it should be required?
Mr. Leonard. Yes.
Mr. Mica. I mean required that the passenger fill it out.
Mr. Leonard. Well, I am at the minimum of the opinion that
documented cases of crimes on ships should be reported by each
ship of each cruise line to a Federal agency and then made
public. That way the cruise line is safe.
Mr. Mica. I am not an attorney, and we have some attorneys
on the next panel, I guess, and I don't know the implications
of doing this, again, the settings and the different ports and
also the registration on most of these ships is----
Mr. Leonard. But this is the Congress of the United States,
sir.
Mr. Mica. Yes. We can pass a law, but is it enforceable,
and I don't know that. I am not an attorney, but we do have a
lot of them around here, fortunately or unfortunately.
Mr. Mulvaney. Mr. Mica----
Mr. Mica. I want to get the other responses.
Mr. Mulvaney. I know. I just misunderstood what you said,
and when you said to me you disagreed with me, does that mean
you would advocate serving 15-year-olds alcohol at Disney
World?
Mr. Mica. No, but we have instances across the board, where
15-years-old and people under the age of the legal age are
consuming alcohol, not only on cruise ships and resorts, but
throughout the world. If you would travel to Europe or some
other destination, people drink without any restriction on age.
Again, my question, I am looking for any improvements that
we can make, and also ask the question about whether or not
these are limited instances, or you see that other areas of
resorts, entertainments, have more or less or the general
public is more at risk. Ms. Kelly.
Ms. Kelly. Yes. I just want to add--basically, I totally
disagree with everything you have just said, but I think this
is a very lawless environment. A number of these cruise lines
are owned by foreign countries, so they don't answer to any
laws. They cannot self police. They've done a horrible job of
it. Have you personally been on any cruises?
Mr. Mica. I have been on many, yes.
Ms. Kelly. So it is your experience that you just think it
is a wonderful----
Mr. Mica. As a matter of fact, let me make a response. Not
only is it a huge employer in the State of Florida, not only is
it a great opportunity for vacation and entertainment, I think
the industry as a whole has done an incredible job in taking
what used to be exclusively the luxurious activity of the
wealthy, the rich and famous--less than half a century ago,
cruises were pretty much limited to people who had huge incomes
or were very famous--and made it into something that the
average person can safely, reliably enjoy, and that is the----
Ms. Kelly. Safely, I don't think is an accurate word.
Mr. Mica. I am sorry. I didn't interrupt you. But I think,
again, if you look at the statistical average--and we can take
incidents. I came also asking for any ways that we could
improve the system, and the gentleman next to you, Mr. Leonard,
has recommended possibly reporting or having some form of
reporting. But again, I think the industry has done an
incredible job of taking this experience--let me just share
with the subcommittee one experience on a cruise ship that I
went on, and again, Florida, we are very fortunate because you
have cruise ports up and down, and you can access them
relatively inexpensively, and enjoy a time with your family,
and I was with my family.
But I was on a cruise ship, and what I just said was
brought home. I was walking down the hall toward dinner, and
this gentleman approached me. And he was walking down the hall
and he had a tie, he had it around his neck. And he said,
``Excuse me, sir.'' He said, ``Could you just help me for a
second.'' I was sort of taken aback. He says, ``I drive a truck
and I'm from Iowa. I've never had a tie on before.'' He says,
``I wanted to wear the tie to dinner, and I don't know how to
tie it.''
And at that point I thought, my God, here is an industry
that has allowed common people to have an opportunity to have a
great experience.
Now, today's hearing doesn't focus on all those great
experiences. It focuses on the rare exception. When you take 40
million people who are passengers who have sailed on cruise
ships. I am a strong, unabashed supporter of the industry. They
are a strong supporter of me because I have always been a
strong support of the industry. If there are problems, I think
what we need to do is correct those problems.
Ms. Kelly. OK. That's fine, and I've heard everything you
said. I just want to interject before I lose my train of
thought, if you don't mind. There's a couple of things. You've
asked for recommendations. I don't know if you were here
earlier, but----
Mr. Mica. No, and I am sorry. My plane was really late.
Ms. Kelly. One of the things that we had suggested was that
passengers be required to wear a microchip or a band of some
kind for tracing. Another suggestion that came up was using
U.S. Marshals, and I said even randomly, because it would raise
the accountability to the employees of these ships. No. 1, I
also want to say too that most of these employees on the ship
that I was from, they were from other countries, so they are
not American crew members. They are coming in from other
countries, Third World countries, with different standards,
different morals, like my assailant was from Jamaica.
Mr. Mica. Again, I think this hearing does highlight some
of the differences in, say, the cruise ship industry and other
activities. As to those recommendations, if I may respond, Mr.
Chairman, first the microchip, maybe some day, not today. It is
almost impossible. I have reviewed, as a senior member of the
Transportation Committee, the security relating to cruise
ships. I am not concerned about what goes on on board relating
to these instances, and the passengers who are sailing, the
typical passengers. My concern is more of a terrorist threat.
An incident in which a cruise ship is used in that fashion and
the failure of the U.S. Government, which is a Federal
responsibility, to adequately protect and secure both the ports
and the cruise ships. That is my concern, not focusing on some
of the, again, issues that this subcommittee is focusing on.
The second point, the U.S. Marshals. Again, I see very few
industries that are more responsible as far as security is
concerned. Let me give you an example. I chair Aviation. The
Federal taxpayer right now underwrites the screening of every
passenger in the United States by some $2 billion. It was not
intended to be that way. The passenger was supposed to pay.
They don't. It comes out of deficit spending. Right now we have
a shortfall of $2 billion out of a $5.6 billion program. In
addition, we pay all the costs of the U.S. Air Marshals. The
plane I was just on had a U.S. Air Marshal on it. The cruise
ships pay for their own security.
In addition, they pay for their own law enforcement and
security because they are traveling on the high seas and they
are responsible for law enforcement on the high seas, once you
leave the U.S. boundaries.
I think they have done an excellent job, one, in security
costs relating to terrorism, in screening passengers, in
screening--it is very difficult--and I can tell you because I
tried to do it--is to even bring your own booze on board. They
even screen for alcoholic beverages that are not supposed to be
in people's possession. I have never seen that at any resort,
entertainment facility, whatever, and they pay all the costs
for all of the above.
Ms. Shaffer, go ahead.
Ms. Shaffer. Mr. Mica, who is responsible for the security
and safety of the passengers?
Mr. Mica. Well, the cruise ship is.
Ms. Shaffer. Then why don't they take care of business?
[Applause.]
Ms. Shaffer. There you go. So I agree with everything you
said. The cruise ship, superficially it is----
Mr. Shays. Ms. Shaffer, I am just going to interrupt you.
It is important for us to have a sense of the audience, but
this is a hearing, and we are going to really try to keep
strict decorum.
I would like to know, just because I want to make sure you
are recognized, how many folks are here from the Cruise Victims
Association? Just raise your hand if you are here.
[Show of hands.]
Mr. Shays. Well, we appreciate you being here, and I will
spend time after this hearing to talk with you about anything
you want me to know.
But I also want to say that Mr. Mica is one of the most
respected Members in Congress, and it is important that he
share his views with you, and that you are very candid with
him. So this kind of dialog that is taking place right now is
probably more important than the dialog you will have with me.
Mr. Mica, we truly appreciate you being here.
Mr. Mica. Thank you.
Ms. Shaffer. Thank you, Mr. Mica.
Mr. Mica. I did come back to try to get some positive
comments, and you asked the question----
Ms. Shaffer. I would like to continue my thought.
Mr. Mica. Well, again, you asked the question, who is
responsible? And I said ultimately the cruise ship is for
security on board the cruise ship, and as I mentioned, they
take on responsibility for other types of security, port
security, law enforcement on board the cruise ship. So there
are different aspects of that, just to respond to you. Thank
you.
Ms. Shaffer. Well, superficially, the cruise industry looks
great. You get on board, it seems to be very Americanized. You
do see security on board the ship. You feel completely safe,
and it's an illusion. It's a false sense of security, and your
industry would do very well and would grow by adopting better
protection and security for the public.
Mr. Mica. Thank you. I appreciate your comments. I might
respond too that, you know, some of security, even that the
Federal Government does is an illusion. I just sat in on a
classified briefing on aviation security on Thursday. It was a
closed door hearing. I get the results back periodically. We
test our system for security because it is a Federal system for
aviation security. The failure rate is pretty dramatic. In
fact, probably most of you would fall off the chairs if you
understood how much of a failure that is, how much money we
have spent, and we spent a fortune. I told you it cost us $5.6
billion, plus $2 billion in deficit spending, to put that
system in place that is not the kind of system that we should
have. Making changes is very difficult, something I work on
every day. I am here to look at how we can make the cruise
experience an even better and safer experience.
Mr. Pham.
Mr. Pham. I do have a solution you're looking for. You
know, my parents never came back from a cruise. There's nine
grandchildren and five of us children, and I'm the only one
here. It's very hard. It's not easy for us to be here today.
We're here because we want to be part of a solution. We were
part of the problem that cost to us now family, so we want to
be here to become part of a solution. While I'm speaking for
myself, I think I can speak for some other fellows of the new
organization we formed, the International Cruise Victims
Association. We went through--we were wronged, and that's why
we're here to share the story.
We're willing to sit down and work with the Congress and
with the people in the industry, and come up with a way to
better improve, as you said, the experience, to better taking
care of the victims, to eliminate what we went through, because
if you look at statistic, and everyone's been saying statistics
and compare and all that, but, you know, you can't compare a
cruise to a city. How about amusement park? How about
Disneyland? Let's look at that percentage, because when I send
my children to Disneyland, there's some expectation that I
have. So let's stop talking about a 3,000-person, versus a
floating city in the ocean. That's totally different, that's
apples and oranges.
Mr. Mica. My question, and I appreciate your comment and
willingness to work with us, you described the problem as you
see it. What is the solution you recommend?
Mr. Pham. The solution is if people sit down with us. Since
we founded this organization 2 months ago, we received hundreds
of e-mails from crew members, sharing with us their experience
as a crew member, what they think is right and wrong. We
receive hundreds of e-mails from people all over the world,
from Australia, from England, from Canada, and what happened to
them. Well, if nobody listens, how can we fix the problem?
Somebody has to listen, and we are willing to share that. We're
willing to sit down and work together, and that's my solution.
Mr. Mica. So far I've heard microchip of some sort, and
like U.S. Air Marshals, and then we had a required form for
reporting, or a standard form for reporting. Did you have a
specific recommendation, Mr. Pham?
Mr. Pham. Working together as a group, with the Congress
and us.
Mr. Mica. Thank you.
Mr. Carver.
Mr. Carver. I appreciate the opportunity. Earlier today in
our testimony----
Mr. Shays. Mr. Carver, I am just going to interrupt. Did
you set this up as a lead to go right down the line? And you
are a very patient man. I thought you might jump in in the very
beginning, but you just timed it beautifully. So, Mr. Carver,
you have the floor.
Mr. Carver. We delivered to the subcommittee today a 10-
point document of various changes to make to the cruise line
industry. We're not going to change the cruise line industry,
but if they were smart, they would take these various items
that we have listed, and say, you know something? These makes
sense. This will give the U.S. public a good feeling about
being on a cruise ship.
Would they cost much money? I don't think they would cost
much money. So you're asking for many suggestions, I have it.
But I want to give you another----
Mr. Mica. I have the list of these, did you make this part
of the record?
Mr. Shays. Yes.
Mr. Mica. Are there any other suggestions that you have?
Mr. Carver. Can I just give another?
Mr. Shays. You can have the floor to talk about this,
because he asked you suggestions. You got three pages of
suggestions, and if Mr. Mica wants to go through it, that's--I
am going to ask you to go through it afterwards.
Mr. Mica. Are there any other things that you think of that
we need to pay attention to that haven't been raised?
Mr. Carver. I have an analogy. This is kind of a different
story, but let's say this is the Aviation Committee of the U.S.
Congress. And an airline came to this committee and said, we
have a new business plan. We're going to license the company in
Liberia because that's very helpful. We don't have to pay
Federal income tax. we're going to staff it with Third World
people, but we want to fly out of New York City, we want to fly
out of Miami, we want to fly out of Los Angeles. Once that
airplane takes off, hey, we got a whole set of different rules.
You may not understand them, but trust us. Now, over the past
few years we've only lost 28 passengers, disappeared. We've had
a couple of hundred people raped, but trust us.
Would you think the American public would allow that
airline to be licensed in this country to fly out of their
major ports?
Mr. Mica. Well, again, we do have very similar situations
in aviation, and we do have many incidents, some reported and
some unreported. Just to show you the way things are changing,
54 percent of all the airline maintenance is done outside the
United States today, and as we speak, you have more and more
international competition, and will have. In fact, that is on
the front burner today, of planes flying into the United
States. One of the problems I have as chairman is, sometimes we
don't have the same protections for Americans, even flying on
another carrier into the United States. And I have gone and
personally reviewed the security in cases such as the shoe
bomber with Richard Reid, he had overridden by the French
police allowing him to board the aircraft carrying explosives
on his person in his shoe. So, yes, I face this all the time.
We don't live in a cocoon, we live in an international arena.
We could actually close down--and maybe that is what we
should do--is close down the cruise lines from docking in any
American ports. That would solve the problem, because they are
international and we don't know everything that is going on
with them, as you said, for ownership. But would that really
solve the problem? And the answer is no.
Mr. Carver. I can only answer it this way. If you were me
and had a daughter disappear from a cruise line, and it goes
unreported and it is covered up, I think you would have a
different passion----
Mr. Mica. Again, each of you have a case in which----
Mr. Carver. Here are suggestions, lots of suggestions.
Mr. Mica. I appreciate your suggestions that you have
brought forth, the positive suggestions because I think my
intent in being here is to look for positive things that we can
do to make it safer for everyone, and improve the system. So,
again, I appreciate the recommendations. Some of them may or
may not be practical. We have to look at them. And then we can
take a safe industry and make it even safer.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yield back.
Mr. Shays. I thank the gentleman. The gentleman was
provided as much time as he wanted, and I just wanted, Mr.
Carver, for the record to show that in response to suggestions,
you provided a three-page, single typed document from the
International Cruise Victims Association. It is thorough. It is
thoughtful. You said background checks, create a main data
base, reporting all terminated individuals, employees, ensuring
that the same employees will not be rehired by another cruise
line. (A) Tighten security checks and screening of all
employees. (B) Although the cost of a vacation cruise may
increase, reliable personnel should be stationed on all decks
at all times.
Then just a second one, international police and U.S.
Marshals. The international police force should be established
at the expense of the cruise line, connected to Interpol or
another international police organization. (A) Such authority
should not be affiliated with the cruise line or its crew. (B)
U.S. Marshals should be present on cruise ships. (C) When a
crime is not reported to the appropriate authorities by the
cruise line in a timely manner, substantial fines should be
imposed. (D) All crimes must be made public, not voluntary but
mandatory. (E) Require protocol for filing any form with
incident, and to be immediately processed through specific
channels.
This is an extraordinary document you have provided, very
responsive. What I am thinking, you are dealing with the loss
of your daughter. You are dealing with the fact that you can't
get basic information from the cruise line. They have treated
you as if you were, in some cases, the perpetrator, not
cooperated. It's an outrage. I thank you from the bottom of my
heart for dealing with your grief, but also coming up with a
very constructive document. It would take me a long time to
read this document publicly. All of it will be for the record.
It will be very helpful.
And I really believe with all my heart and soul that Mr.
Mica will appreciate this as well. He serves on the
Transportation Committee. He can probably do more legislatively
than I can do as an investigative committee. I view him as your
friend, and he has voiced, obviously, concerns that this be an
appropriate hearing, but one where we get at the truth. You
provided a wonderful document on behalf of all of your members,
so I salute all your members.
It is still the first panel--is there anything that you all
want us to put on the record before we go to panel two? Real
quick, Mr. Leonard. Put the mic close to you. Prove to me you
can do that.
Mr. Leonard. I have one specific issue to raise in the
interest of preventing terrorism. We noticed, my wife and I and
others, foreign nationals, three and four from the same
country, screening passengers and their baggage on the ship in
Bermuda. That should never take place. Three and four foreign
nationals from the same country screening baggage.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Is there anyone else that would like----
Mr. Leonard. I am not the only one who saw this.
Mr. Shays. Anyone else who would like to--yes, Mr.
Mulvaney?
Mr. Mulvaney. Can I put the picture of the 15-year-old girl
who was killed in the record?
Mr. Shays. Yes, we will put that in the record.
[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. Shays. How is she related to you, Mr. Mulvaney?
Mr. Mulvaney. Distant, through marriage.
Mr. Shays. It is very nice that you came to testify today.
Mr. Pham, I want to say to you that how proud I am that you
have become an American citizen. I am struck by how gracious
you are, how thoughtful you are, how patient you are. You lost
your mother and father. You love this country through and
through, and I love the fact that you are a fellow citizen, and
I appreciate your testimony more than you can know. I would say
thank you to each and every one of you, but the image of you
coming on a small boat to the United States eventually, is
quite an image, and you have contributed wonderfully to the
work of this Congress, all of you have, but I particularly want
to thank you, Mr. Pham.
Thank you very much. We are going to go to the second
panel.
In our second panel we have three panelists: Mr. Brett
Rivkind, Rivkind, Pedraza & Margulies; Mr. Ron Gorsline, owner,
Security Ocean Services; and Mr. Lawrence W. Kaye, Kaye Rose &
Partners.
Before you sit down, I will swear you in, and that is
probably a logical way to do it.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Shays. Note for the record, our witnesses have
responded in the affirmative.
We attribute all three of you as experts on the cruise line
industry. If you have in any way, just for the record, not so
in any way it colors what you say, but it is just important,
whether you are speaking independently or whether you have
represented the cruise line industry, whether you do now, in
other words, just so we get a sense of your perspective. And if
we just run through that and then take your testimony, Mr.
Rivkind.
Mr. Rivkind. Good afternoon. Thank you for having me here.
I am a maritime lawyer for the past 23 years in Miami, FL,
handling cases mostly with the cruise ship industry. For the
first 4 to 4\1/2\ years of my career, I represented cases
brought against the cruise ship company. Since then, now I
exclusively represent victims of accidents or crimes aboard the
cruise ships.
Mr. Shays. It is just helpful to know that.
Mr. Gorsline.
Mr. Gorsline. My name is Ron Gorsline. I am the owner and
operator of Secure Ocean Services. My background is I have
worked extensively in various different security areas, and I
have worked in the cruise line industry for the last 3 years.
Prior to that I have done work for the State Department as a
security consultant on various contracts to protect different
entities within the Government interests overseas. And prior to
that, I had a 20-year military career in Special Operations in
the Navy.
Mr. Shays. So do you represent the cruise industry,
families, or somewhere in between?
Mr. Gorsline. I was asked to be here as an independent
expert to kind of balance things out, based upon my experience
in doing audits in the cruise industry for various different
companies.
Mr. Shays. Thank you. And you had met in my office as well
earlier?
Mr. Gorsline. Yes, sir. I gave you a full brief on my
experiences with various different cruise companies.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Rivkind.
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, Congressman Shays, I did forget to
mention I am the attorney for the parents and the sister of
George Smith.
Mr. Shays. Yes, that is important to put on the record.
Thank you.
Mr. Kaye.
Mr. Kaye. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Congressmen. My name is
Larry Kaye. I'm a maritime attorney. I've practiced maritime
law for 27 years. During that time I've been immersed in
representing cruise lines and the cruise line industry. I've
also served as outside counsel to the International Council of
Cruise Lines, and I started my career as a maritime attorney
after a clerkship with one of our chief Federal judges.
Mr. Shays. The bottom line is we have three experts in the
cruise line industry and maritime travel, and we appreciate all
three of you being here, and it is nice that you are so
patient, and that you heard the first panel and what they had
to say.
Mr. Rivkind, we will let you start.
Mr. Rivkind. OK, thank you.
Mr. Shays. We are going to do a 5-minute. We are going to
roll it over. I give a little bit more quarter to the second
panel, since they sometimes have to go through a lot listening
to the first. But we prefer, after you get in the second half,
if you would bring it to a close. So 5 minutes. Then we will
roll the clock over for another 5, but finish before the 10.
STATEMENTS OF BRETT RIVKIND, RIVKIND PEDRAZA & MARGULIES, P.A.;
RONALD J. GORSLINE, OWNER, SECURE OCEAN SERVICE, LLC; AND
LAWRENCE W. KAYE, SENIOR PARTNER, KAYE, ROSE & PARTNERS, LLP
STATEMENT OF BRETT RIVKIND
Mr. Rivkind. OK. Thank you, Congressman Shays. Good
afternoon. Again, my name is Brett Rivkind, and as I described,
I am a Miami maritime lawyer for 23 years. All of my work,
almost exclusively at least, has involved the cruise ship
industry and handling cases with the cruise ship industry.
I am honored to have been asked to testify today before the
subcommittee. I understand the purpose of this hearing is to
address international maritime security, including law
enforcement, and law enforcement is an important distinction,
as Congressman Mica was talking about, terrorists and
terrorism, and we are here, I believe, to discuss law
enforcement on the cruise ships to protect passengers who
actually board the cruise ships, which is a different issue,
and passenger security, as well as the investigations of these
incidents that occur to passengers, and I will limit my
testimony to those areas, and these are major areas of concern
at this time.
Twenty-three years ago when I graduated law school and went
into maritime law, I was intrigued with the complexity of the
jurisdictional issues and the foreign nature of shipping, and
the complexities, and they made for good law school exams.
Today, 23 years later, we are on the second hearing, still
discussing complex jurisdictional issues, 23 years later in a
much more serious context. These are not law school exams,
these are issues that are greatly impacting on the safety of
our passengers on these cruise ships that operate out of our
U.S. ports.
Cruise ships have just boomed. In the 23 years I have been
doing this, the ships are getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
Ships are carrying over 2,000 passengers, 13 to 14 decks high,
with 1,000 crew members from Third World countries, with very
little or minimum background checks. All the ships now are
flying foreign flagships. We've just read recently where a ship
is being built that will hold 5,000 passengers. This has to be
of grave concern to us and to the safety of passengers on board
the ship with this tremendous growth.
With this tremendous growth, we've seen an increase in the
number of crimes. The statistics really are not what's
important here. You have significant crimes on cruise ships,
and cruise ships are confined environments, and it is easier to
protect citizens and prevent crimes from occurring in the first
place on a cruise ship than it is in a city.
I have always felt a concern for this industry which
operates out of the United States and carries millions of U.S.
passengers each year, yet has reaped the advantages of being
able to incorporate in foreign countries and fly flags of
convenience, enabling cruise ship operators to avoid many U.S.
laws and regulations. I too am from Florida and understand the
significant of the cruise ship industry.
The foreign nature of the cruise ship industry, as I said,
has resulted in a situation where the employment of the crew is
almost exclusively from countries outside of the United States.
Many Third World countries, many poor countries, and in my
experience over the years, although the cruise lines state that
they have agents to hire crew members in the different
countries who may be responsible for some type of background
check, many crew members save for years to pay a fee under the
table to these agents to secure an employment letter to come
and work on a cruise ship that are carrying our U.S.
passengers, with no background checks.
It's been necessary to discuss the foreign nature of this
cruise line industry because it is the nature of the beast,
which leads us to the questions that Congress is addressing for
a second hearing already.
It's apparent from hearing these issues discussed today,
and from the hearing that was held previously in December, that
there is a big void or gap when it comes to the laws or
regulations governing the cruise ship industry. That does
impact upon the safety of a passenger who decides to embark on
a cruise with one of these foreign incorporated, foreign flag
cruise ships.
It's time to closely look at this industry. U.S. citizens
should not have to rely upon the cruise ship industry itself
for protection against criminal activity aboard a cruise ship.
A U.S. citizen should not have to rely on the industry itself
to adopt and implement their own internal standards governing
crime on board the ships, especially when the bottom line of
the industry is profits, billions of dollars in profits.
I heard mentioned earlier, and I would indicate that I am
an attorney in a case, class action case involving a cruise
ship that deliberately went into a storm to maintain an
itinerary, and I heard that mentioned earlier by the panel, and
I would just mention that as I do have some background in that
case too, and some information.
The cruise ship industry attracted much more public
attention in the mid 1990's, not that they wanted to, but due
to an outbreak of Legionnaire's Disease, reports of sexual
assaults on board the ships and how they were being handled by
the cruise lines, as well as violations of the U.S.
environmental laws.
The violation of the environmental laws led to numerous
felony convictions and millions of dollars in fines being
imposed. Some of the felonies that the cruise lines pled guilty
to involved falsifying official ships' logbooks, which were
referred to by the crew members as fairy tale books; destroying
evidence and providing false testimony to a grand jury, and
tampering with evidence. The U.S. Government and the U.S.
public were lied to about environmental matters. Yet this is
the same industry that currently U.S. citizens rely upon to,
``voluntarily report crimes,'' as well as to voluntarily
implement adequate security aboard the ships, and to adequately
conduct investigations of any allegations of crimes aboard
their cruise ships.
What we have learned today from listening to the victims
from this great organization that has been formed, is that
these stories are a result of the nature of the beast, of an
industry that regulates itself, that conducts its own
investigations on board the ships, and that has an incentive
not to honestly and accurately report or investigate crimes.
You can say all you want, ``We report a crime, we don't have
to, but we do, and here are the statistics,'' but it doesn't
matter.
You need to know when they reported it, how they reported
it, what happens before it's reported, what happens before any
U.S. authorities get involved, and what do these statistics
really mean if we don't have adequate classifications of the
crimes, definitions, like we in the United States, where we
have index crimes, we have uniform definitions of what
constitutes a crime, methods of reporting, collection of that
data sent to a centralized agency, and we can then say how much
crime is there in each particular city throughout the United
States and each county. We cannot do that in the cruise ship
industry.
If a passenger reports something as stolen, and the cruise
line decides, based on their own internal investigations, to
say it's just a missing item, you don't have a crime there.
These statistics cannot be relied upon.
I've heard the suggestions made by the International Cruise
Victims organization. I've gone over those, and they are very
good suggestions. One of the main things I believe is that you
have an industry investigating their own crimes and accidents
that they may be held accountable for in a civil setting, and
there's something just inherently wrong with that.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Rivkind follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you, Mr. Rivkind.
Mr. Gorsline.
STATEMENT OF RONALD J. GORSLINE
Mr. Gorsline. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon or
evening, as it is right now. My name is Ronald Gorsline, and
I'm the owner of Secure Ocean Services, LLC, and I thank you
for the opportunity to be present to testify as an expert
witness in the subject of maritime security as it relates to
the cruise industry.
My company is a small company providing internal compliance
auditing services for security programs in the cruise industry.
Our job is to act as an honest broker while conducting internal
audits and marking recommendations to correct program
shortfalls, and identifying program strengths, as we identify
them in our findings.
Today I am testifying about security practices, training,
qualifications, jurisdiction of foreign flag vessels as
incidents may occur on board those vessels. My testimony is not
intended to point fingers as to cause, or add speculation on a
company's conduct, but rather to clarify process and procedures
as required by law.
In the United States and in the International Maritime
Organization, there are rules that govern how the security
program is set up aboard ship. For the United States, we are
governed by 33 CFR part 101, and Part 104, specifically 104 for
ships. International Maritime Organization adopted a regulation
called the International Ship and Port Security Facility Code
[ISPS], Parts A and B. Those are the cornerstones for the
security programs on board ships.
The officials who are responsible for enforcing such laws
on board the cruise ships ultimately is the master of the ship.
He is the law enforcement authority while a ship is at sea and
under way. The master overall is responsible for the vessel as
shown, and is governed by regulations Part 104 CFR 33, 140.205
in the U.S. Code, and by the ISPS Code, Part A, Section 4.10 in
the International Code. And at all times, the master of a ship
has the ultimate responsibility for the safety and security of
a ship, even at security level 3. A master may seek
clarification or amendment of instructions issued by those
responding to a security incident or a threat thereof, if there
is reason to believe that compliance with the instruction may
imperil the safety of the ship. That's his job.
The overall structure, as reflected in my testimony, gives
you a brief breakdown of how it can be looked at in a picture.
You have a company that has a company security officer, who is
ultimately the program manager for the security program in the
system. On board the vessel you have the master, who is the
ultimate authority, and you have a vessel security officer. The
vessel security officer is responsible for security on board
the ship, but he reports to the master. If an incident occurs
on board, the vessel security officer is the point to address
the problem on board. The master is responsible overall for the
execution of the process.
The company security officer is notified in that process,
and then they consult on how to address the problem, upon which
the company security officer notifies the law enforcement
entity or agency that is to be the investigating authority.
Training overall, what is available on cruise ships for
security as far as technology and application of those items as
a security plan is considered security sensitive information,
so I can't go into specifics on ships' numbers or anything like
that, but I can give you a general idea.
There are metal detectors, both walk through and hand
wands. They have x-ray machines. They're experimenting with new
trace detection technology. They're looking at microchips.
There is training on all of these items that are out there.
Alarms and weather decks in certain areas where the passenger
is not authorized to be working as far as the line handling
area, forward section, chain locker and those areas.
They have a swipe card system that is attached to an ID
photo that was taken upon check in, and that ID photo is
transmitted into the system, and then every time somebody
swipes their card to come on board it is confirmed by visual
biometrics of who they are.
Modern vessels today are basically totally automated. Those
cards are used to access, as was identified and spoken to
earlier in the first panel, to basically handle your accounts,
access in your rooms and everything else. The older vessels
have a swipe card system for identification purposes, and
normally you'll be issued a key for the room if they don't have
the automatic key locks.
Personnel training. I've enclosed in here in my testimony
and I won't go through each line item. Each position on a ship,
as identified by both U.S. and International Code, what the
training requirements are for each position. The companies have
to meet that. That training is done. It is logged and it is
entered into the training records as individuals are carried on
board the ship.
As I said earlier, you have the master, the vessel security
officer or the ship security officer under ISPS Code. You have
those individuals that their primary responsibilities is
security, and then you have those individuals who have
secondary responsibilities in security. They have varying
different levels of degree. Then after all that is said and
done, there's a secondary training process where companies set
up to do report writing, handle issues that come on up as far
as techniques and circumventing security techniques and doing
crime scene collection of evidence, and then packaging it and
turning it over to that authority once they report on board to
do the investigation.
The special maritime territorial jurisdiction of the United
States has been expanded to include places outside of the
jurisdiction of the Nation when those offenses are against the
Nation of the United States as part of U.S.C. Part 18, and
among those offenses is special maritime territorial
jurisdiction of the United States are the crimes of murder,
manslaughter, maiming, kidnapping, rape, assault and robbery.
That comes under all Title 18.
As stated earlier, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is
the investigating entity under maritime code, and the Coast
Guard captain of the port is overall responsible for those
items in the port when a ship is stateside the United States.
The policy is a single industry standard that requires
allegations of on board crime be reported to the appropriate
law enforcement authorities with vessel calls on U.S. ports of
crimes involving U.S. citizens would include the Federal Bureau
of Investigation. They are the responsible authority to do
that.
The companies, the industry as a whole has a zero tolerance
for crimes on board committed on board vessels. If crimes do
occur, the appropriate law enforcement authorities will be
called to investigate, to prosecute to the fullest extent of
the law. The cruise industry continues to cooperate with
authorities to ensure that the perpetrators of crime are
brought to justice. This is a requirement.
As previous testimony in December 13, 2005, the agreements
are in place with the membership of the ICCL companies, and the
flag states addressing communications with the lead agencies to
investigate all cases once reported.
In addition to the above, trafficking of illegal drugs and
narcotics is included and is also investigated by the Customs
and Border Agency.
While on board the vessel, the vessel security officer and
the ship security officer will refer to the incident report
procedure to collect evidence, interview witnesses, assemble
the report, package all material to be turned over to the
investigating authority upon arrival in the next port.
Additionally, the company security officer will be notified of
the incident and give direction to the VSO and coordinate
actions with the master and the VSO and the appropriate agency.
In the event forensic evidence is to be collected of a
scientific nature, then ships doctors will more likely be
pressed into service to administer such things as rape kits to
confirm a complaint.
Personnel training and capability will vary from company to
company. Some companies have their own academies to provide
this training. Other companies will subcontract their training
out to an appropriate training authority that can do that.
Others will have people come on board and do what they call
training programs. But training is occurring. They have to meet
these guidelines.
In short, on the jurisdictional issues on the flag vessels,
I really don't want to go into that too deeply because I'm not
a lawyer. I do know this, that foreign flag vessels are flag
states. Flag states are contracting governments who signed up
to the IMO and adhere to the ISPS Code in addition to their own
laws. Flag states also have their own recognized security
organizations that are referred to as RSOs. The RSO in most
cases is a class society designated by that flag state as a
verification arm to ensure that the ISPS Code is being followed
by the ship or the company that is flagged under that flag. The
RSO will ensure the ship flagged has a security plan that meets
the ISPS Code. The RSO ensures the international ship security
certificates, issues them on out for the flag state, and
ensures that the vessel will have an IMO number of
registration, fly a flag of that nation. Examples are Bahamas,
Panama and Liberia. The foreign flag ships avoid U.S. domestic
maritime policy and taxes.
The United States isolates domestic policy from
international through the Jones Act. Domestic policy requires
that you have to build at home, crew at home and own at home to
carry cargo between U.S. ports.
Mr. Shays. I need you to finish up here.
Mr. Gorsline. I'm going to do that right now, sir.
In short, there are five areas that need to be addressed
here that verify the Congress has the ability to act upon
requirements to enact laws to meet the territorial jurisdiction
of the United States.
One, there is a territorial jurisdiction if a ship enters
or acts occur within a territory of a particular country, then
that country's laws apply.
Two, under the ``national'' theory, the country where any
alleged crime perpetrator resides has jurisdiction over the
matter involving a perpetrator.
Three, the nation with the custody of any alleged
perpetrators of certain types of crimes can claim jurisdiction
under the universality principle.
Four, under the ``passive personality doctrine,'' the
Nation where the victim resides can exercise jurisdiction over
a matter.
Five, any country whose national interests are affected by
an incident can assert protective jurisdiction.
I hope I have answered your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Gorsline follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Mr. Kaye.
STATEMENT OF LAWRENCE W. KAYE
Mr. Kaye. Mr. Chairman, Congressman Mica, I thank you again
for inviting me to testify today. I am very proud of my
representation of the cruise industry over the last 30 years,
but I'm even prouder of my role as a son, brother, husband and
father of three. There is nothing that I can say to detract
from the tragedies that these families who have testified here
today have told us about, and I want to begin by extending my
deepest sympathies to each of them and their families.
Hopefully, the information I've been invited to provide
will assist them and you in understanding the legal obligations
that currently govern this industry, and that's my sole purpose
in being here. I commend you and the subcommittee for taking
the time to explore them.
The fact is that we don't have a very complex system of
laws governing cruise ships. It may seem that way if you're
confused about it, but our U.S. criminal jurisdiction on cruise
ships does provide a very high level of protection to Americans
traveling anywhere in the world. It starts with the U.S.
Constitution, which states in Article I that Congress is
authorized ``to define and punish felonies committed on the
high seas.'' That is exactly what our Congress has done. Over
the years it has asserted our national power over some 20
different categories of crimes in what is referred to as the
special maritime jurisdiction of the United States. These
include everything from sexual misconduct to robbery and theft,
to terrorism and murder, and everything in between.
On U.S. flag ships--and there are some today in fact
sailing in Hawaii--our Federal Government has jurisdiction over
those crimes anywhere the ships operate, involving any soul on
board. On foreign flag ships, our criminal jurisdiction in
these crimes extends to anyone in U.S. waters, Americans on the
high seas on those vessels, or even Americans in foreign waters
if that voyage on that foreign ship starts or ends in the
United States. It is as simple as that.
In my 27 years of legal practice I have never heard of a
situation where an agent of the FBI has been denied access to a
foreign flag vessel seeking to do an investigation. I've just
never heard of that happening. Usually there is a report made.
There is a request to do the investigation, and with open arms,
they board the ship.
These same Federal maritime statutes ironically have been
incorporated into the Federal aviation scheme, and as
Congressman Mica no doubt is aware, the Federal criminal laws
that apply to international aircraft boarding passengers in the
United States, incorporate by reference the Federal crimes that
apply in the special maritime jurisdiction. So Congress was so
satisfied that scheme was clear and comprehensive enough that
it simply rolled it over into the aviation industry.
We know there are 31 million passengers, 10 million a year
approximately in the cruise industry. There are 72 million
passengers a year in the airline industry boarding foreign
craft in U.S. airports.
Even though cruise ship passengers, I think we can all
agree, are much safer from crime than inhabitants of even small
cities cross the United States, because of these Federal
criminal laws, they have the protection of the FBI as their
enforcement resource. On land, where these crimes are much more
prevalent, victims are relegated to the protection of the local
police station. Crimes on cruise ships can and have been
prosecuted under the full panoply of our Federal court system,
including nationwide subpoena power over witnesses and
evidence, national and international extradition, and a
worldwide investigative capability second to none.
I'd like to turn now to crime reporting because I think
this is an issue that has sadly been very misunderstood,
perhaps even by the attorneys that are advising some of the
people who have suffered these tragic losses. The fact is that
regulations on the security of passenger vessels were passed by
this Congress in 1998, and amended in 2001 and 2002. They
expressly requires all ships, regardless of registry, sailing
to or from a U.S. port, to report any felony that occurs in a
place subject to U.S. jurisdiction to the FBI.
Now, as we've just seen, places subject to the U.S.
jurisdiction include the high seas and even foreign waters of
other nations when an American is involved. About 85 percent of
the North American cruise industry are voyages out of U.S.
ports, Florida, California, Hawaii and Alaska. For the 15
percent or so of cruises that don't touch a U.S. port, the
cruise lines, nonetheless, still report all felonies involving
Americans to the FBI. That is where the industry's zero
tolerance voluntary reporting policy kicks in, and that is in
addition to the mandatory requirements.
Now, even so, on January 10th of this year, immediately
after this subcommittee's last hearing, the International
Council of Cruise Lines arranged a meeting with the FBI, Coast
Guard, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement and others. The
purpose was to discuss a thorough review of those reporting
procedures to ensure a consistent and uniform protocol, so that
every agency interested in a particular class of matters would
receive whatever report it desired.
I also want to add that in checking the airline industry,
despite the fact that there are seven times the number of
patrons flying on international carriers from U.S. airports,
and despite the fact that the same Federal crimes apply on
aircraft, there is absolutely no requirement legally for
airlines to report any crimes to anyone.
The statistics of crime in the cruise industry are reliable
because of the mandatory reporting, and they show that cruise
ships are remarkably safe. Out of the more than 31 million
passengers carried over the past 3 years, passengers and crew I
should say, there were 178 total claimed sexual assaults, 24
missing persons, excluding the 5 who were rescued or found, and
4 robberies. When you factor in how many of the incidents
involve passengers, it works out to less than 4 claimed sexual
assaults per million carried, which ironically, happens to be
the exact same statistical chance of a person being struck by
lightning. I was surprised to find that out myself. The numbers
translate into 1 reported robbery for every 8 million carried;
12 of the 24 missing persons were tragically determined to be
likely suicides, and I am not including Mr. and Mrs. Pham in
that number, one an accidental fall overboard, and that leaves
11 truly missing out of 31 million.
This is by no means to minimize these occurrences because
even one such incident on a cruise is one too many, especially
if it were your loved one.
Briefly, I want to outline that U.S. civil jurisdiction on
cruise ships also gives passengers as high or higher protection
than patrons on land. It's another reason why the cruise
industry has every incentive to ensure that their ships are
safe. United States and even foreign passengers have very broad
access to U.S. courts. If the cruise line is based in the
United States, as is every major line of the ICCL, a U.S. form
for resolution of their grievances must be provided. By Federal
statute, if the ship even touches a U.S. port, any provision of
the ticket that weakens the right to a trial or tries to limit
damages for negligence is legally void.
I can tell you that all cruise ships today have security
teams with extensive military of law enforcement backgrounds.
Closed circuit cameras, x-ray screening, computerized door
locks that record all entrances into cabins, computerized ship
access identification systems that match passenger and crew
photos to the individual boarding, rape kits, strict
segregation of passenger and crew areas, non-fraternization
policies, no guest policies, security rounds, and zero
tolerance for crime are commonplace in the cruise industry
today.
Until the FBI or other appropriate authorities begin
investigations, cruise lines provide the same or better
response to potential crimes as their shore-side counterparts,
but like airlines, hotels, restaurants, theme parks, resorts
and the like, they neither have the expertise, nor the legal
authority to perform criminal investigations or prosecute
crimes. So they rely on the responsible authorities to do so,
but the next port of call is typically less than a day away,
and the ships are in constant radio communication with the
authorities, and follow any and all instructions given.
I thank you again for the opportunity to testify.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Kaye follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you, Mr. Kaye. I thank all three of you
for your testimony.
We will start with Mr. Mica, and since there are only two
of us, what we will do is we will do 10 minutes, but then you
can have another 10 minutes, and another.
Mr. Mica. Thank you. I don't know if I will take that much
time, Mr. Chairman, but I appreciate all three of the witnesses
in this panel.
I made a full disclosure before. I am not an attorney,
although I am a Gator like Mr. Rivkind. Although I never went
to law school, I have tried to practice adopting and enacting
some laws from a different side of the aisle. But, Mr. Kaye,
you seem to indicate from your testimony and you seem to be
fairly expert that there are laws in place and there are laws
that protect U.S. citizens, and I think you also tied it into
the aviation industry so that the American traveler who gets on
a cruise ship cannot be under the impression after this hearing
that they are left in some lawless state.
Are these laws adequate then and in place?
Mr. Kaye. Absolutely.
Mr. Mica. That is a beautiful answer. OK.
Mr. Gorsline, from some of the other things we have heard,
it is like nobody is in charge on a cruise ship, but I think
you outlined that, in fact, there is a real pecking order as
far as law and enforcement. We have heard that there are laws
that govern, that protect American citizens. On the cruise
ship, then, the captain is the chief officer, and he has the
authority in international waters and is required to obey
international laws and the other pertaining laws. Is that
correct?
Mr. Gorsline. Yes, sir, that is correct.
Mr. Mica. Then you went down the chain of command, so there
is a chain of command.
Mr. Gorsline. Yes, sir, there is a chain of command.
Mr. Gorsline. I am not that familiar with cruise ships. Mr.
Chairman, I think that Mr. Rivkind--and we might want to
correct the record because I heard his verbal testimony was
different from his testimony that he submitted to the
subcommittee. He said, ``The foreign nature of the cruise ship
industry has also resulted in a situation where the employment
of crew is almost exclusively from countries outside the United
States, including poor, undeveloped, Third World countries.''
That is his statement that he submitted for the record. Is that
correct, the one I have up here? But his verbal testimony, if
we go back and check the record, was a little bit different. He
said that almost exclusively the crews were Third World--let's
say. I tried to copy it. Third World countries, giving a
different impression that the whole crew is basically a bunch
of Third World folks that do not really know what is going on.
I am not that familiar, again, with the industry, only what
I have seen. Aren't most of the cruise ship captains and the
key staff that you outlined, Mr. Gorsline, aren't they from
sort of developed countries like Italy and Greece
predominantly? Would that be----
Mr. Gorsline. Sir, in my experience on the ships that I
have surveyed and done audits on, the operational staff,
including chief officers and everything else, yes, they are
either Norwegian, German----
Mr. Mica. Are they from Third World countries--now, the
registry may be different, like you may have Liberia, Bermuda.
I don't know where they register. Again, I can only go by my
observation, but for the record, aren't most of those people
who are in charge and responsible, as Mr. Kaye has outlined,
for actually executing the law, they are not from Third World
countries, are they? Would that be--I mean----
Mr. Gorsline. In my experience, sir, that would be correct.
The senior officers on board----
Mr. Mica. Mr. Kaye, do you have any knowledge? I mean, the
ones I have seen--and I have talked sometimes--sometimes I get
invited to meet the captain. I have only met Greeks, Italians,
British.
Mr. Kaye. Norwegian.
Mr. Mica. Not Third World countries. Norwegian, yes.
Mr. Kaye. French.
Mr. Mica. Scandinavian.
Mr. Kaye. Italian, French, United States.
Mr. Mica. Are you aware of any cruise ships that have their
people in command from Third World countries, either of you? I
would ask for the record.
Mr. Gorsline. I have not witnessed any, no, sir.
Mr. Kaye. I don't think I can identify any.
Mr. Mica. Thank you.
You know, I think you said also, Mr. Rivkind, was it your
testimony before Congress that statistics are not important? I
wrote that down. You said statistics are not important?
Mr. Rivkind. I would like to address that, of course, your
question, but I would like to get back----
Mr. Mica. No. Did you say in your testimony before this
subcommittee that statistics are not important?
Mr. Rivkind. I don't think statistics should be focused on
the way they are with this industry and----
Mr. Mica. OK. All right. I am----
Mr. Rivkind. I would like to make a comment----
Mr. Shays. Just 1 second----
Mr. Rivkind. I would like to make a comment----
Mr. Shays. Hold on.
Mr. Rivkind. OK.
Mr. Shays. Because, Mr. Mica, you have no limit to time, I
do want to make sure the witnesses respond, and I am eager to
know what his answer was. I do not want to take you from your
thought, but allow him to just finish.
Mr. Mica. He testified--in fact, I wrote it down before I
went back and read something else. He said, ``Statistics are
not important,'' and I have a little quote, and I have R, which
is Rivkind. The others are a G and a K. So what----
Mr. Rivkind. I am ready to respond.
Mr. Shays. Yes, and I would like to know your answer to his
question.
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, I think in the context of what we are
discussing, as was mentioned at the last hearing, when I heard
an FBI official, a Coast Guard official, and a U.S. Navy
official here in these hearings say that the statistics
provided are meaningless, and I heard that. I attended the last
hearing, so I think that----
Mr. Shays. In the context of this, just to make sure,
because I do not want to exaggerate, meaning in the context
that they cannot be certain they are accurate.
Mr. Rivkind. Exactly.
Mr. Shays. That was the basis. They cannot certify that
they are accurate because they are being provided--no, let me
just finish. Just because you were not at the hearing, and I
just want to make sure the record is clear. Because based on
the fact that they are voluntarily provided, that was the
basis. And that is what we are trying to determine----
Mr. Mica. Well----
Mr. Shays. And let me just continue, because you will have
your time. There was indication afterward that the FBI may have
felt they overstated that statement, that there is some meaning
to it, but they cannot guarantee their validity. That was their
basic thrust.
Mr. Mica. OK. Well, see, again, I am not an attorney. I
just pick these things up here. He said in testimony before
that statistics are not important. But someone handed me this
article after you said that and said it--and I get misquoted in
the press all the time, and I think this is a better--I mean,
it is a statement I want to enter in the record, which I think
is important, that Mr. Rivkind has said. I think we need honest
statistics, and we should--if we require it under the law--this
is in a Miami Herald article dated Sunday, February 12, 2006.
Now, I raise that because, Mr. Kaye, you told me there was
a reporting requirement. So is there or isn't there a reporting
requirement? I don't know. Can you tell me, Mr. Kaye?
Mr. Kaye. There is absolutely a reporting requirement. They
are found in Title 33 of the Code of Federal Regulations,
beginning at Section 120.
Mr. Mica. OK. So that would provide us with some honest
statistics? Is there any other way? You know, can we use
chains, prods, electrical--is there some way to get more honest
statistics? Is there something--the other thing, too, I was
sort of wondering. And, again, also, one thing for the record,
Mr. Chairman, and also Mr. Rivkind, just for the record, Mr.
Rivkind made the comment and referred to me, a Member of
Congress, and my comment and took it--and I want to clear it
just for the record, just so that it is clear, that somehow I
as a member did not understand the difference between security
and law enforcement as it might apply to cruise ships.
Just for the record, I wanted it clarified that, you know,
I am not the smartest guy in Congress, but I do know the
difference, and I did express my deep concern for all of those
who had some incident which, in fact, they related before this
committee. All of them were tragic, and I expressed my concern
about security. But for the record, Mr. Chairman, and for Mr.
Rivkind's information, I expressed my concern, my personal
concern. I thought I had disclosed that I was chairman of the
Aviation Subcommittee, a senior member of the Transportation
Committee. My concern is the failure of the Federal Government
to provide adequate port security, not just for cruise--and I
should elaborate that for the record--also for cargo vessels
and other maritime vessels, and the terrorist threat.
So I do have concern about people who have experienced a
horrific incident, wherever it is. I just wanted to be allowed,
Mr. Chairman, just to provide that commentary for the record.
Mr. Rivkind, just a question here. I understand you
represent the International Cruise Victims Association. Is that
it? Did you start it or you represent them?
Mr. Rivkind. I am acting as legal counsel for them.
Mr. Mica. OK. Do they pay you a salary or you do it----
Mr. Rivkind. No, sir.
Mr. Mica [continuing]. Pro bono? And how many people belong
to this association, do you know?
Mr. Rivkind. It is growing in number each day. Kendall
Carver would have a better idea of the exact number. He is the
president of the organization.
Mr. Mica. So you don't know how many victims are
represented?
Mr. Rivkind. Currently, I don't want to give you a number
that is not exactly accurate. Kendall Carver would be better
for that.
Mr. Mica. All right. Now, you have a law practice, and I
was reading some of your history, a great history in legal
aspects of, I guess, maritime litigation. Today, most of it,
though, would be described as in suits against the cruise
industry or people who might have some cruise industry
interests. You represent people, passengers and other folks,
who have been injured or have some problem with the cruise
industry. Is that correct?
Mr. Rivkind. That is correct. My first 4\1/2\ years I
represented cruise ships only. I am proud to say that all I do
is represent injured victims.
Mr. Mica. Over a 23-year period, the last 19----
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, sir.
Mr. Mica. Well, again, I come from Florida, and I just see
what I see on TV. Again, I don't know that much of what is
going on. One of the problems we have in Florida, of course, is
the proliferation of suits against everybody. I mean, you get
up in the morning and, you know, if somebody looked at you
cross-eyed, call this number and you can sue.
One of the things that concerns me is the proliferation of
attorneys, particularly in Florida, around the cruise industry
now suing the cruise industry. In fact, I don't know, maybe you
have heard this. I saw people actually passing out little
flyers and legal cards at some of the ports. Have you heard
that is going on?
Mr. Rivkind. I did not----
Mr. Mica. And these are--I have to qualify. That is, you
know, like let's sue--has anything gone wrong with your trip or
your cruise? Would you like to sue? Have you heard of that?
Again, I have heard some. I have seen a little, just the trips
I have seen.
Mr. Rivkind. I would like to respond. First I would like to
say I am in the middle of a trial, and a lot of these comments
sound like many of my jurors about tort reform and the
necessity of tort reform, and I can see where your position is
on that. I also understand, as you have made clear, you are a
great friend of the cruise ship industry, and I do sue them,
have for many years, and I am proud of it.
If people are at the ports handing out cards or flyers or
anything like, I don't know----
Mr. Mica. But you don't do that and you don't advertise for
those kinds of cases, do you, publicly?
Mr. Rivkind. No, sir--in what sense? You are talking
about----
Mr. Mica. Well, handing them out is one thing, but do you
advertise that, you know, if you want to sue a cruise ship or
just that kind of litigation, that is your bag?
Mr. Rivkind. I do not actively advertise my services.
Mr. Mica. OK. And, again----
Mr. Rivkind. I am word of mouth. I do not even have at the
current time a major Web site advertising my services.
Mr. Mica. I don't want to embarrass you----
Mr. Rivkind. I get my cases through word of mouth.
Mr. Mica [continuing]. But have you made a lot of money
from suing the cruise industry? I mean, hundreds of thousands,
millions a year?
Mr. Rivkind. I am proud to say that based on my legal
abilities and taking cases with a lot of credibility against
the cruise line industry, and thank God, you know, there are a
lot, a lot of cases with a lot of validity and credibility
against the cruise line industry, and that is the problem.
Mr. Mica. I am sure that----
Mr. Rivkind. Maybe if they cleaned up their act, you know,
it is a disincentive for me to be here and I wouldn't be making
so much money.
Mr. Mica. Well, from the description you gave, as the
industry gets bigger, those ships get bigger, you will have
plenty of opportunity, from what I have heard.
Gentlemen, just a couple of closing questions. Again, I
come from Florida. I am familiar with some of the different
tour industries, resort industries. I don't know of any
industry that has the security measures both, say, entering a
resort, exiting a resort, that the cruise industry has. I mean,
I have seen it. They take your picture. They verify. They check
it. Is there any industry--when we went to see--with the
President, they did wand us, but we did not have to show our ID
or anything. Are you aware of any tourism industry that does
that? Aviation I know does not do it. The airlines do not do
it. We do it with the people that check actually your picture
and ID--this is kind of ironic. They are probably some of the
lowest-paid people and they are not TSA or Federal----
Mr. Kaye. I am not, Congressman. My----
Mr. Mica. Are you aware of anyone----
Mr. Kaye. No, and I would add that in the cruise industry,
cruise operators are required to give passenger manifests to
the government so that they can do a pre-screening against
criminal watchlists. And crew are screened in the same manner
in order to get C-1 visas to work on cruise ships so that there
is--you know, we know who you are before you get on.
Mr. Mica. Mr. Gorsline.
Mr. Gorsline. I don't know of any other industry either,
sir. It is pretty thorough.
Mr. Mica. Well, I am just trying to get an ID for pilots
and crew of an aircraft. Have you ever seen a pilot ID? It
looks like something that comes out of a Cracker Jack box. Now,
we do have a new one coming online, but it does not have even
the things that are required of a passenger getting on a cruise
ship, and that is wrong. I do not want to justify that.
Well, Mr. Chairman, just a few questions. I appreciate your
forbearance and I yield back.
Mr. Shays. Thank you----
Mr. Mica. Mr. Chairman, if I may, I have not been to my
office. I got off the plane, the late plane, and I would like
to ask a unanimous request that the record be kept open for a
period of at least--is 2 weeks OK? Is that a problem?
Mr. Shays. That is----
Mr. Mica. A period of at least 2 weeks for additional
questions to be submitted to some of the witnesses.
Mr. Shays. Right. Happy to do that. In fact, we will not be
having another hearing--yes, sir?
Mr. Rivkind. May I say something to Congressman Mica before
you leave, since I understand you are leaving?
Mr. Mica. I don't think the----
Mr. Rivkind. There are three areas----
Mr. Shays. No, Mr. Mica, seriously, if you are going to
leave, let the gentleman have his say.
Mr. Rivkind. It will take a couple minutes, sir.
Mr. Shays. Well, no, not a couple of minutes. Make it
quicker.
Mr. Rivkind. He made three statements that I consider----
Mr. Mica. Mr. Rivkind, excuse me. I do not have the time. I
am a Member of Congress----
[Audience groans.]
Mr. Rivkind. A fellow Gator, you made an attack in three
areas----
Mr. Mica. No, Mister----
Mr. Rivkind [continuing]. On what I believe is my
credibility, and I would like----
Mr. Shays. Hold on a second, guys. Hold on.
Mr. Mica. Since when does a witness----
Mr. Shays. Hold on.
Mr. Rivkind. I just want to respond to three areas----
Mr. Mica. I was going to ask----
Mr. Shays. Would both gentlemen please suspend?
Mr. Mica. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. Just suspend a second. We have allowed you 15
minutes to ask any question. You do not have to stay while a
witness speaks, so you are free to leave.
Mr. Mica. Mr. Chairman, under the--may I?
Mr. Shays. Sure.
Mr. Mica. Under the rules of the subcommittee, under the
rules of the House, you have been most generous in giving me
10, I think a total----
Mr. Shays. Fifteen.
Mr. Mica [continuing]. Of 15 minutes. Under the rules and
procedures of regular order of this subcommittee, of which I
have been a member for some--going on my 14th year, my time has
expired. I was merely going to ask you if you would grant
enough time either from your comments--I have no further time,
but I would ask your request to----
Mr. Shays. No, let me just be----
Mr. Mica [continuing]. Give the gentleman an opportunity
before I left, before he interrupted me.
Mr. Shays. No, the bottom line is you have no time limit.
You have got----
Mr. Mica. Well, again, I yielded back, but, again----
Mr. Shays. OK, sure. Thank you.
Mr. Rivkind, if you would like to say something, and then I
have a lot of questions I want to ask.
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, there are three things that were
mentioned that I did not get to respond to and I think I was
unfairly attacked about. One was the comment about hiring crew
members from Third World countries. It is true that the
officers tend to be not from what we would call ``Third World
countries,'' but most of the other crew members are. There is a
major cruise line that does hire many of their security
personnel from the Philippines, which last that I knew of
constituted a Third World country. At depositions they admit
that most, if not all, of their crew members below officers are
hired from Third World countries.
Why is that important? Because we are talking about crimes
on board ships. Most of the reported crimes, unfortunately, are
crimes committed by crew members, most of the ones that are
reported. Most of those from cabin stewards and the type of
crew members that are accused of these crimes do come from the
Third World countries, and that should be a concern of the
Congress because, as I stated on my experience, it seems that
those type of crew members can get a job on a cruise ship very
easily. They buy the employment letters. There are very little
background checks, and we have heard from another witness
today----
Mr. Shays. What is your next point?
Mr. Rivkind. The next one was statistics. When I say that
the statistics aren't important to me, when I hear a comment
that we cannot rely on the statistics, that they may have some
meaning but they may not be accurate, and we know that
statistics can be manipulated, in my opinion they aren't
important. We have a problem here, an obvious problem, and that
is what I meant in the context of saying statistics were not
important.
Mr. Shays. As you are a lawyer, probably a better choice of
words rather than ``important'' is they may be misleading. OK.
Mr. Rivkind. Thank you, Congressman. And then the last one
was I did not in any way, shape, or form try to say anything
about your intelligence, Congressman Mica. I am sure you are a
highly intelligent, schooled individual. You did mention
earlier that you were concerned more with terrorism and port
security than law enforcement on board the ships, and I was
just trying to make a distinction because what we are talking
about here is not all these treaties and these international
laws that deal with protecting ships from terrorism, but actual
onboard law enforcement, and that is what I meant by that
comment, and I did not mean any disrespect with that comment.
So thank you.
Mr. Shays. Thank you, and let me just thank Mr. Mica for
being here, because he has added to the work of this committee
tremendously, and there is no one I frankly respect more. Thank
you.
Mr. Kaye, first off, I appreciate your testimony. You are
the only one that has told me it is simple, and it may very
well be, so you got my attention up front. We wrote to the
Coast Guard after our last hearing, my staff member, Dr.
Palarino, and he wrote to the head of liaison for the Coast
Guard, in an e-mail dated March 6th, and he said, ``Michael, I
have a lawyer telling us that passenger vessel operators or
security officers of vessels embarking and disembarking
passengers from U.S. ports are to report to the Coast Guard and
the FBI any felonies committed on board a cruise ship. Is this
correct? Because this is not what was reported to us at the
last hearing.''
The response from Commander Michael Lodge, ``The industry
has initiated a self-imposed requirement to report such
incidents; however, there is no Federal law or regulation, nor
is there any international treaty or customary law that
requires such a report.'' Nick responded to that--Dr.
Palarino--``Michael, you guys are the experts and I believe
you, but what about the CFR cited? Am I not reading it
correctly?''
Response from Commander Lodge: ``33 CFR 120.220, `that
occurs in a place subject to the jurisdiction of the United
States,' while some crimes are covered under the special
maritime and territory jurisdiction of the United States, 18
U.S. Code Section 7, this limitation would not reach all
vessels and all crimes.''
So what are you saying and what is he saying, and how do we
connect them?
Mr. Kaye. OK. Well, I guess what is most important is what
the regulation says, and I have it in front of me. Section
120.220(a), which is entitled ``What Must I Do to Report an
Unlawful Act and Related Activity,'' and it states, ``Either
you or the vessel security officer''----
Mr. Shays. And who is ``you''?
Mr. Kaye. The shipping line, the ship owner.
Mr. Shays. OK.
Mr. Kaye [continuing]. ``Or the vessel security officer
must report each breach of security, unlawful act, or threat of
an unlawful act against any of your passenger vessels to which
this part applies or against any person aboard it that occurs
in a place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.''
And then elsewhere it defines ``unlawful act'' as a felony.
Mr. Shays. What is the penalty?
Mr. Kaye. $6,700.
Mr. Shays. OK. To the cruise industry?
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. So why when we were meeting with the--when we
had the FBI and the Coast Guard, they don't see it the way you
see it?
Mr. Kaye. Well----
Mr. Shays. Let me just say and preface it by saying that
says to me there is something more to the story.
Mr. Kaye. I will give you my most honest answer. I wasn't
at the last hearing----
Mr. Shays. I want your least honest--no, no. [Laughter.]
Mr. Kaye. You will always get my most honest answer.
Mr. Shays. I will get your honest answer. There is not a
most honest.
Mr. Kaye. I wasn't at the last hearing. I don't know the
expertise of the witness who testified. I did review in detail
the transcript or Mr. Swecker, and I did notice that when he
was asked about extraterritorial jurisdiction on cruise ships,
he initially stated, ``This is not my area of expertise.'' And
that is a quote from his transcript.
Mr. Shays. Fair enough.
Mr. Kaye. I can also tell you that the people at the
seaports, like the gentleman quoted over here who is in
charge--it is the blue board to the right, the middle one, the
special agent in charge of the Florida seaports, he seems to be
satisfied that the reporting is very thorough, and I can tell
you, in California, where I reside, the FBI is fully aware of
the obligation to report. And when someone other than the
cruise line or its officer reports, they become very irritated
because the report under this regulation is supposed to come
directly from the cruise line.
Mr. Shays. So if the theft is under $10,000, it is
reported?
Mr. Kaye. It is not necessarily reported unless it is a
felony. Recall that these regulations define ``unlawful act''
as a felony. So that----
Mr. Shays. I thought theft--so an $8,000 theft is not a
felony?
Mr. Kaye. It is not a felony, sir. A felony kicks in at
$10,000. In addition, there is a January 2000 memo from the FBI
to the cruise industry, which you may hear about from some of
the cruise line representatives, that was disseminated that
specifically directed the cruise lines to report thefts only in
excess of $10,000.
Mr. Shays. When the cruise line industry makes a comparison
to the public sector, if someone steals $5,000, that is
reported and it is statistically part of a community's record,
correct?
Mr. Kaye. On land?
Mr. Shays. Yes, on land.
Mr. Kaye. If a person reports the theft, I assume so, yes;
just as if I assume that if a person----
Mr. Shays. But that wouldn't be reported on a ship?
Mr. Kaye. If the person chose not to report it?
Mr. Shays. No, no. I just am trying to understand
statistics--you know, frankly, I want to say I have no dog in
this fight. But what I do react to is when I feel like I am not
being told the truth or that I am steered this way when, you
know, if I was more knowledgeable, I would go in this
direction. You heard the first panel, and I think I have faith
that what they told me about how they were treated was accurate
subject to not being convinced of that. Every one of those
stories raises a question about the sincerity of the cruise
line industry, frankly. So my antenna is up. I am suspicious.
So then we hear statistics that say, you know, there are
only so many of a particular category, and then 10,000
passengers decide, and then they compare it to a town. Well,
you know, a town just does not have people living there for a
week. So when you divide the 52 weeks into the number of
passengers, you get to a community more like 200,000. Then I
think, well, in a community of 200,000, you actually have
policemen, and you actually have people who are trained in a
variety of detective work. And so then I start to draw
comparisons, and then all of a sudden the comparisons don't
hold because the security people are not necessarily trained
the way some would be trained in Darien, CT, or New Canaan, CT,
with 20,000 people, 23,000, 30,000, or whatever, or my city.
So I am just trying to explain to you that I am trying to
sort this out. We have now the Coast Guard saying there are
certain requirements that they don't have to report, and we
have you citing the regulations. I want to make sure, because
you are under oath, that you are totally comfortable with
giving me the impression that reports are required, because we
will have another hearing and we will invite you back if the
information pushes us in this way when, in fact, you did not
tell me the rest of the story.
So one part of the story is that--and you said ``felony.''
It has to be $10,000 or more. If you had $8,000 stolen from
you, would you not be outraged that was not part of the record?
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. OK. So technically, the comment about a felony
is significant, but then I have to know the rest of the story.
That is $10,000 or more. And so what I am asking you is do you
think most of the crimes would be under $10,000?
Mr. Kaye. Most----
Mr. Shays. Crimes. I didn't say ``felony.'' Most of the
thefts would be under $10,000.
Mr. Kaye. Yes, most of the alleged thefts, I think yes.
Mr. Shays. Well, not alleged thefts. Thefts, whatever they
are. I mean, because there are thefts, not alleged thefts.
There are thefts. You become alleged when you try to put a
number to it, but you and I will both agree that there are
thefts on board, and you and I would both agree that probably
most of the thefts--not alleged thefts but most of the thefts
are under $10,000. I am not playing a game with you. I am
just----
Mr. Kaye. No, but I can't determine something is a theft
until a law enforcement authority or a court determines it is a
theft.
Mr. Shays. Don't be a lawyer here. I am just----
Mr. Kaye. No, I am just being honest.
Mr. Shays. No. Are there thefts under $10,000?
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. OK. They are not alleged thefts. They are
thefts.
Mr. Kaye. Some of them are alleged thefts that----
Mr. Shays. Some are and some aren't.
Mr. Kaye [continuing]. Are proven not to be thefts.
Mr. Shays. Let's forget the alleged thefts and let's talk
about thefts.
Mr. Kaye. OK.
Mr. Shays. OK. Now, all I am asking you is: Would it be
your testimony that there are more thefts under $10,000 than
more thefts over $10,000? That is an easy answer. The answer is
yes.
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. OK. Now, then the question is: Shouldn't that
information be provided? Wouldn't I want to know, if I was on a
cruise ship, that I could have a $5,000 theft or a $2,000--I am
going to be pretty unhappy if someone--if I decide this trip is
costing me $2,000 or $3,000, it is a great week, and then I
have $3,000 stolen from me. In my own mind, that cost me
$6,000. That is not a good deal.
So what I am just trying to say is: So the rest of the
story is your testimony, anything over $10,000 has to be
reported, alleged or not, or actual, any alleged has to be.
Mr. Kaye. Correct.
Mr. Shays. And my point to you is: Would it not be
important for all statistics to be provided but that the FBI
may not want to or choose to investigate something that is
under $10,000? That is another issue. What I am trying to do is
sort out where we go.
Mr. Kaye. Yes, and I guess the question I am left with is
where would you draw the line. If it is a pair of sunglasses, I
mean, these are the types of things that are allegedly stolen
on cruise ships. Oftentimes they are lost. Sometimes they are
stolen. And so where would you draw the line? I agree that at
some place a line needs to be drawn, but people may differ as
to where that line should be drawn.
Mr. Shays. OK.
Mr. Kaye. But I think the cruise industry would be happy to
draw the line wherever they are asked to draw the line.
Mr. Shays. I think that is true. Now if someone breaks into
my house, is that a felony?
Mr. Kaye. Yes. Burglary, yes.
Mr. Shays. So if someone breaks into my room, is that a
felony?
Mr. Kaye. With force, yes, I believe it is.
Mr. Shays. I don't care if it is with force. How about a
key?
Mr. Kaye. I am not an expert in criminal law, so I am
searching my criminal law class 30 years ago.
Mr. Shays. But I think you know what----
Mr. Kaye. Potentially, yes.
Mr. Shays. I think you know where I am going.
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. I am just----
Mr. Kaye. I think there is an element of force involved,
which is, you know, what I am trying to explain.
Mr. Shays. Well, if someone broke into my house in
Bridgeport, CT, where I live--and everybody knows I live
there--I am not going to care whether they broke a window to
come in or they were able to pick the lock or whether they were
able to find a key, because maybe one of the workers who worked
at my house gave them the key because I gave them the key. I
don't really care. I don't have a cleaning service, but if I
had a cleaning service who had a key and somehow that got--I
would still expect my police department to take this crime
seriously and investigate.
Mr. Kaye. Sure.
Mr. Shays. What we are being told is if it is $10,000 or
more, it gets investigated; if it is $8,000 or less than
$10,000, it does not get investigated by the FBI. They have
drawn the line.
Mr. Kaye. That is correct.
Mr. Shays. So who investigates?
Mr. Kaye. The cruise industry will investigate it, and they
will make a record of it, in my experience, and the passenger,
if they wish to pursue it further, can take it up with the FBI.
There is jurisdiction over theft under 18 U.S.C. 661 below
$10,000. Absolutely, the FBI has jurisdiction over thefts below
$10,000.
Mr. Shays. You were here when Mr. Leonard testified about
his theft.
Mr. Kaye. Yes.
Mr. Shays. What was your reaction?
Mr. Kaye. I really didn't have a reaction.
Mr. Shays. Why not?
Mr. Kaye. My reaction was----
Mr. Shays. I had a reaction. I think probably everybody in
this room had a reaction. But why wouldn't you have a reaction?
Mr. Kaye. My reaction was, to be honest, why wasn't it
reported to the authorities by the Leonards.
Mr. Shays. As opposed to what they did?
Mr. Kaye. In addition to what they did. If they felt that
the cruise line wasn't reporting it, why didn't they report it?
Mr. Shays. You know, my reaction was, My God, this guy went
through 100 ways to try to get the attention of the cruise
industry and the line, and they just basically gave him a stiff
arm. That was my reaction. And I would have thought, as someone
representing the cruise line, you would have said to me, ``This
is not a good reaction on the part of the people I represent.
This guy deserves to be treated better.'' That is what I would
have thought you would have felt.
How did you feel, Mr. Gorsline, when you heard that?
Mr. Gorsline. My personal feeling, sir, is that the
situation warranted some action. Not having been involved with
it, I really can't comment on whether that action was
appropriate or not. You know, just on face value from what I
heard, I would have sought out additional avenues to get
compensated, you know, figure out what had happened and get my
report taken care of.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Rivkind, how did you react?
Mr. Rivkind. I reacted the same way you did, Congressman. I
thought that, you know, it was inappropriately handled by the
cruise line, and it shows, even if there are procedures in
effect, that they don't get followed.
Mr. Shays. So what we have had is three witnesses that lost
family members; we had one witness who was raped, allegedly--
and I am hesitant to put the word ``allegedly'' because I would
want to give her the benefit of the doubt on that--and we had a
young girl who was given lots of drinks and went overboard.
I would like each of you to walk down how you reacted to
each of these testimonies. Let's start with you, Mr. Kaye. How
did you react to Mr. Carver's testimony?
Mr. Kaye. I think what happened to Mr. Carver was
absolutely horrible and inexcusable.
Mr. Shays. Was the firing of the supervisor--was he the one
responsible ultimately, in your judgment?
Mr. Kaye. I think he was one of the people responsible.
Mr. Shays. Who else was responsible, in your judgment?
Mr. Kaye. I think the cruise line was responsible morally
to make sure that notification went out and that there was a
followup. Unfortunately, the line apparently never became aware
of the situation.
Mr. Shays. But when they did become aware of it, did you
see them as part of the solution or still part of the problem?
Mr. Kaye. I honestly don't know enough about the case to
answer that. I don't know----
Mr. Shays. Well, let me just talk hypothetically. Do you
think they should provide him the information he is requesting?
Mr. Kaye. Depending on the information, yes. I don't know
what information he requested, and I don't know what
information was not given.
Mr. Shays. OK. Well, he testified about some of the
information. Maybe you were not listening to that part.
Mr. Kaye. I was listening.
Mr. Shays. OK. Do you think he was entitled to the
information that he requested?
Mr. Kaye. Again, I don't recall what information he
requested that he was not given.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Gorsline, I am talking about Mr. Carver.
Mr. Gorsline. Mr. Carver's case, I think it was a complete
breakdown of human factors in the whole process with the
supervisor. And that being said, that was the logjam
involvement, the company being made aware of it and their
response, again, I think that was--I wouldn't have settled for
that personally myself.
Mr. Shays. I think you are very generous, Mr. Gorsline. I
mean, the gentleman said, ``My daughter was on board your ship.
Your steward knew that she was missing. You knew that she never
came to claim her belongings. You proceed to get rid of her
belongings, and you never told any of the family.'' Hello?
Mr. Gorsline. I agree, sir.
Mr. Shays. And then once he came forward, wouldn't you have
thought that they would have said to Mr. Carver, ``What can we
do to make things right from this point on? How can we
cooperate? What are all the things that you need to know? And
what can we do to help?'' Wouldn't that have seemed like the
logical way?
Mr. Gorsline. My personal opinion, sir, I would have set up
a casualty assistance team, more commonly referred to as a GO
team, and once the information became available of that
occurrence, there would have been security on top of Mr. Carver
giving him anything he wanted.
Mr. Shays. OK. Mr. Rivkind.
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, Congressman, I think the way they handled
that was outrageous. I think it is easy to blame a supervisor,
but it goes to the top. You know, it goes to the training. It
goes to the mentality of anytime anything happens on a cruise
ship that the crew members, including supervisors, are there to
protect the company. And I have cited in my written testimony
the position the cruise line has taken in a lawsuit by Mr.
Carver that I think is also outrageous. They have responded to
his claim that they inflicted emotional distress upon him by
not releasing all this information about his daughter, basic
information. Their response, Congressman, was not to sit down
and say, ``We will give you the information. We want to give
you some closure. We want to help you.'' Their response was,
``We do not owe you any duty to investigate.'' And I think that
is very, very telling, and I have attached that memo to my
written testimony.
Mr. Shays. That is, frankly, one of the motivations for our
having this hearing. If the cruise line industry was eager not
to have us proceed, they could have treated someone like Mr.
Carver in a much different way.
I will start with you on Mr. Pham.
Mr. Rivkind. I think the same thing. I think that they are
quick to characterize an incident as a suicide. You have heard
the testimony, Congressman, that it does not appear that there
were factors to suggest that. And it again goes to the source
of the problem. This is an industry that likes to characterize
anything that happens on board their ship, including the
Master, whom we have heard is responsible for enforcement of
all the rules and regulations on the ship and the safety of the
ship, that anything that happens on a cruise ship, it has been
my experience that the mentality of the Master of the ship is
nothing wrong happens on his ship. ``It is a suicide.'' ``It is
consensual sex.'' And I know we are not talking about it now,
but at any time you would like me to, it applies to the George
Smith case, too.
Mr. Shays. We are talking about the witnesses that came and
testified.
Mr. Rivkind. Right.
Mr. Shays. You are representing the Smith family, correct?
Mr. Rivkind. Yes, sir.
Mr. Shays. So that is another day.
Mr. Gorsline.
Mr. Gorsline. Again, sir, I would have done the same thing.
I would have set up a casualty assistance team and gave the
Pham family everything they needed. Why things didn't happen
that way, I don't know the case and I am not a lawyer, but as a
security person, a security expert, and having dealt with many
situations like that, the first thing you usually do is you
address the issues and the needs of the family or the persons
that are involved in the situation when it arises.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Kaye.
Mr. Kaye. Based on what I have heard, there appears to be a
very serious problem. But as in most cases, there are usually
two sides.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Kaye, what would you do if you saw someone
fall overboard or jump? You are on board the ship. Where would
you go?
Mr. Kaye. I would immediately go to any one of the
thousands of employees on the ship and tell them. I would
throw----
Mr. Shays. No, don't get carried away here. There are not
thousands of employees. There are about 900 employees, right?
Mr. Kaye. Depending on the size of the ship, there may be
close to 2,000 employees.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Kaye, with all due respect, I feel like I am
playing a game here with you. I have been told by the cruise
industry that most of the ships are 2,000 passengers with 900
employees. Should I go back to these folks and have them tell
me differently? That is what I have been told. I know there is
going to be a 5,000-passenger ship, but I am told most are
around 2,000. Are most of them 3,000 or 4,000? So tell me, I
mean, you are the expert.
Mr. Kaye. Most of the ships have over 2,500 passengers and
over 1,000 crew members.
Mr. Shays. OK.
Mr. Kaye. In my experience.
Mr. Shays. So thousands or--you are under oath and under
testimony here. How many crew members are there in a 2,500-
passenger ship?
Mr. Kaye. I believe over 1,000.
Mr. Shays. Over 1,000. How many?
Mr. Kaye. I believe, although I am not certain, 1,200 to
1,500.
Mr. Shays. OK. So you would go to any one of the employees
on board the ship, and what would that employee do?
Mr. Kaye. Normally, I believe, if I first went to an
employee, they would immediately contact the bridge, and they
would begin a man-overboard procedure.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Gorsline, what would you do?
Mr. Gorsline. I would flag down an employee, tell them to
contact the bridge that they have a man overboard. And because
of my background, I would look for the nearest life ring with--
--
Mr. Shays. The nearest what?
Mr. Gorsline. Nearest life ring with a blinker on it and
throw it over the side to try and mark the spot. But that is me
personally because I have that background.
Mr. Shays. Do you think most employees know instantly what
to do if someone is overboard?
Mr. Gorsline. I know there is a man-overboard procedure on
board the ship. The abilities to effectively execute it is
totally dependent upon their training and how often and how
familiar they are with that.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Rivkind.
Mr. Rivkind. My knee-jerk reaction would be, of course,
obviously to flag down the first person I could, hope they
speak English, and hope that the crew member is somebody who
has some training and knows what to do. I would have doubt
whether all the crew members would.
Mr. Shays. OK. Let me just say that if Mr. Kaye had said
the last point, I would question him, so I want to question
you. The implication is that most people don't speak English.
Do you think that is fair?
Mr. Rivkind. Not all--not the most.
Mr. Shays. Do you think that is accurate? Is the
implication of what you just said that most people don't speak
English?
Mr. Rivkind. I think a majority of crew members may not
based on my experience. There are increasing requirements now
occurring to place more English-speaking crew members on board
the ships, and they currently are doing that. My experience
over the years has been there has been a great number of the
crew members, you know, even some of the officers, you know--
and if they speak English, it is not thorough, complete
English.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Gorsline, how many security people are on
board a ship of, say, 1,000 employees or crew members? How
many--and by ``security,'' I mean people that would function
like police officers.
Mr. Gorsline. Sir, based upon 49 CFR 1520, I cannot go into
those numbers because they are classified security sensitive
information.
Mr. Shays. You know, can I say something? I have just been
waiting for someone to do that. Why is it OK for me to know how
many police officers are in Darien, CT, and it is not all right
for me as a passenger to know how many police officers are on a
ship?
Mr. Gorsline. Sir, with the current security posture of the
country and the industry and what we have to deal with on a
regular daily basis, it is not prudent to make that information
available.
Mr. Shays. Is it not prudent because we do not have enough?
Mr. Gorsline. Oh, no, sir. We have enough. I will tell you
this, sir. Let me give you this for----
Mr. Shays. Your testimony is that you have enough. That is
what----
Mr. Gorsline. Yes, sir, we do. I will say from my personal
experience on the ships that I have audited, there is plenty of
security people on board, and the programs in place in tiered
level to go ahead and back them up to the nth degree. A case in
point, I will give you a perfect mathematical example----
Mr. Shays. Do they carry weapons?
Mr. Gorsline. I cannot give you that information, sir. They
are trained in crowd control and maintaining control of a ship.
Mr. Shays. Are they trained in institutions or are they
trained on board the ship?
Mr. Gorsline. It depends on the company, sir. Most
personnel that are hired in those positions are of a security
background, whether it be former military or former law
enforcement.
Mr. Shays. So your testimony before this subcommittee is
that most have military training?
Mr. Gorsline. Yes, sir. The ships that I have done, yes,
although the foreign flag ships will have persons that are not
U.S. military, but they are former military background.
Mr. Shays. See, what I would think would be that you would
want me to know they are armed, that you would want me to know
they are extraordinarily capable, and the fact that this is not
information that somehow people would share makes me think that
we are almost reluctant to have people know because it is not
satisfactory. That is my implication from----
Mr. Gorsline. Can I clarify, sir?
Mr. Shays. Sure.
Mr. Gorsline. Here is the situation and the numbers. I am
going to go point by point here. If you were to take a city, as
New York City--and I use New York because that is where I am
from. You have 8 million inhabitants and you have 43,000 law
enforcement officers on the books. You divide that into three
shift. That approximately comes out to 13,333 people per shift,
if they all show up. Normally it is between 7,000 to 10,000
people. That puts one police officer per thousand people,
roughly, in that city--OK--on a shift, on an 8-hour shift. OK.
The cruise industry has security personnel that covers that
many times over. Now, as to the question of weaponry and
protection, I will say this: Cruises have their own
personality. Every cruise is addressed with a different
security level based upon the requirement of what the cruise is
going to be going underneath. They have their basic levels. The
regulations are set up for those basic level. But if you have a
spring break cruise, you may add some additional things. You
may put a law enforcement officer or two or four on board to
assist the security staff to deal with rowdy individuals in
like-type situations. If you have a charter party where you
have dignitaries or that kind of thing, they bring their own
security on board if it is that kind of situation, and that
enhances the cruise security on board the ship.
But the basic level of security is there. Additionally to
the security force, the crew will have responsibilities based
upon the increase of the mar-sec level based on the terrorist
threat. And those crew members that have been designated by the
Emergency Response Plan will augment the security department.
So the numbers increase exponentially.
Mr. Kaye. Mr. Chairman, may I throw in a comment here?
Mr. Shays. Sure.
Mr. Kaye. I understand where you are coming from, and I
think it is a very legitimate question. The difference between
a cruise ship and a city is that a cruise ship is a self-
contained environment. A city has, you know, limitless
resources.
Mr. Shays. Right.
Mr. Kaye. And so, you know, when you start talking about
what the exact capabilities are, you are by definition telling
people what the limitations are. I may be going out on a limb
here, but it may be completely appropriate for this information
to be divulged to you in private.
Mr. Shays. No, but see, what my view is, if you had
sufficient security, it would almost be a disincentive to do
something on board a ship. And so you view it as a way to give
someone an opportunity to know how they could overcome the ship
or to commit a crime. I view it the opposite. I view it as
saying, my gosh, they got so many folks, I wouldn't want to
fool around.
So it is interesting, our two different perspectives.
Mr. Gorsline. Sir, can I just comment on that part also? In
my career, I worked a lot of surveillance detection for the
State Department. We did a lot of work on identifying those
individuals that would cause harm to U.S. facilities, and that
was part of the deal, we would go on out and basically bird-dog
certain places where certain people would hang out and identify
their posture, their profiles and everything else, and we would
put them in categories.
Now, put that in reverse mode. That is exactly what happens
when somebody comes on a cruise ship that wants to identify its
weaknesses. They call it a vulnerability assessment. If you
identify a vessel's vulnerability and you determine how to
defeat it, you put everybody on board that vessel, crew and
passengers, at risk. This is part of that.
Mr. Shays. Let me ask you this: Do you think it is a
disincentive to crime or an incentive to crime to know we have
a marshal on board a plane?
Mr. Gorsline. On a plane? On an aircraft?
Mr. Shays. Yes.
Mr. Gorsline. I think personally that any motivated
individual or entity that is going to carry out an act and has
identified an entity to do it on is going to do it. If the
marshal is there and he gets the job, which is about 3 seconds
to respond, because at the last level, Level 7 of an attack
when it occurs, is recognition of an attack. If that marshal
can recognize----
Mr. Shays. You are talking a different language to me. I
just asked a simple question. Do you think it is an incentive
or disincentive?
Mr. Gorsline. It is a disincentive. If you can make a
target harder, they will move on. But if you put a marshal on
there, you are going to take something--you know, you have to
account for how many marshals are you going to put on. What
jurisdiction are they going to be?
Mr. Shays. Let me ask the question again. Do you think it
is an incentive or a disincentive to let people know that we
have a marshal on board an airplane? All you have to do is tell
me you think it is an incentive or not an incentive or you
don't know. What is your answer?
Mr. Gorsline. For the passengers?
Mr. Shays. For someone to commit a crime on board. Tell me
your answer.
Mr. Gorsline. I think it is a disincentive. If you make a
target harder, they are going to move on to the next target.
Mr. Shays. OK. And the fact that they know it is a
disincentive.
Mr. Gorsline. But part of the marshal program, sir, if I
just say, is that you don't know who the marshal is. You just
know they are out there.
Mr. Shays. Fine. So let me ask the next question: Do we
have marshals on board ships?
Mr. Gorsline. To my knowledge, in the cruise industry, no,
sir.
Mr. Shays. OK.
Mr. Gorsline. Now, if the cruise line wants to go ahead and
put one in for a specific cruise, i.e., hire a local sheriff's
department or a police officer to come on board----
Mr. Shays. See, but I like those, if the crimes are
investigated by the Federal Government, why not have a Federal
official on board the ship?
Mr. Gorsline. Because a Federal officer would not be in his
jurisdiction because the flag of the ship is not flagged United
States.
Mr. Shays. So help me out, Mr. Kaye. You are trying to make
me feel comfortable that the Federal officials are going to
quickly get involved, and we have testimony from Mr. Gorsline
that they shouldn't be on board the ship because Federal
officials are out of jurisdiction there.
Mr. Kaye. I don't think legally that answer flies. I think
that if there is a crime on board involving an American, a
Federal official on board would have jurisdiction. Absolutely.
Mr. Shays. OK. So----
Mr. Kaye. But he might not have jurisdiction over nationals
of a foreign country who are victims of crimes if the incident
is on the high seas.
Mr. Shays. Fair enough. It is just that I am just thinking,
you know, a crime is committed and then how does the FBI agent
get on board to investigate when the ship is out to sea. I am
just wondering, if these ships are so expensive and we have so
many people and so many employees, and we are willing to put a
marshal on board an airplane, is not one of the suggestions
made by the group before us that we do that, someone with
Federal jurisdiction, is there not some logic to it? Mr.
Rivkind.
Mr. Rivkind. Well, Congressman Shays, my experience--and I
think we have heard it also from the FBI, my direct discussions
with the FBI--is I think Mr. Gorsline is correct, when you fly
a foreign flag, you are the country of that flag. And the FBI
has stated--there may be criminal jurisdictional statutes where
they can enforce in court a crime that is committed on the
ship, but as far as getting on board that ship, there are a lot
of complex issues there. They have to get permission of the
cruise line or the Master because that is a foreign-flagged
ship, and if the ship is in a foreign country, there may be
some relationship with that particular foreign country, too,
that has to be worked out for them to get on board the ship.
And we have a case involving where the FBI wasn't allowed to
board the ship for some period of time. It is up to the Master.
He controls that ship. It is the country of the flag.
Mr. Shays. Let me ask you, Mr. Kaye, not here but later--
and Mr. Gorsline, and you, Mr. Rivkind, to review the
suggestions that were made by the International Cruise Victims
Association. I think that in my time in Congress this is a
very, I think, fine example of people trying to make a
contribution who have felt they have been victims. It may be
that some are just simply not going to do what they want or are
not feasible or are simply not affordable. But I do think in
here it would be helpful to know your reactions.
And let me tell you what--I don't usually do this, but what
I think I have learned from this session. Mr. Kaye, your
comment that the records that crime statistics of a felony have
to be reported is going to stand with me. I at the last hearing
believed it wasn't. We have spoken to the Coast Guard. They say
no. You have cited regulation. That is going to stand until I
hear differently.
The fact that it is $10,000 or more for a felony says to me
that it is not really as helpful as it should be. I think
crimes below $10,000, if they are not going to be investigated,
should at least be reported.
I have mixed feelings about, Mr. Kaye, your response to
some of the folks that testified, because I felt like with
every one of them, admittedly some alleged, but all of them
heartfelt, that at the very least the cruise industry should
have been, once they knew what had happened, once they felt the
agony of the family, should have been moving in a different
direction than they moved.
And I will say, because I know that Jennifer Hagel-Smith is
here, and I had read from her letter previous, the one-page
document that I read, condensed from evidently six pages, I
think overstated her circumstance in terms of not necessarily--
her claim was that no one was there for her. In the context of
what she meant, I do have empathy for what she meant. She had
believed that there would be security people and so on.
I was a little surprised, I will say, with the response of
the cruise industry. I felt--excuse me, the cruise line. I felt
that their response to her comments was maybe accurate to a
point, but a little insensitive given what she has gone
through.
And so we are going to have the next panel. I think what we
will try to do is convene at least their statements. And is
there anything you would like to put on the record before we
get to the next panel, any closing comments?
Mr. Rivkind. I would just state, Congressman, that the
president of Royal Caribbean Cruise Line has gone on national
television saying, ``We are the only industry that is not
required to report a crime.'' So I think that maybe in the next
panel----
Mr. Shays. We will sort it out.
Mr. Rivkind [continuing]. That should be addressed, yes.
Mr. Shays. Yes, this is not the last hearing.
Mr. Rivkind. OK.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Gorsline, any comments you would like to
make?
Mr. Gorsline. No, sir. I think I have said all I need to
say.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Kaye.
Mr. Kaye. No, Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much.
Mr. Shays. Thank you, and I want to say to all three of you
your testimony has been very helpful, and, Mr. Kaye, you are
the first person who has ever claimed it is simple, and it may,
in fact, be more simple than we think, but it may not be right.
So, with that, let me thank you all very much.
Mr. Kaye. Thank you, Congressman.
Mr. Shays. I do not usually convene a panel at 5:30. Are
they still here? Excuse me, 6:30. Mr. Charley Mandigo, Director
of Fleet Security, Holland America Lines; Captain William S.
Wright, senior vice president, Marine Operations, Royal
Caribbean, accompanied by Dr. James Fox.
We have two people giving testimony. Mr. Mandigo, Captain
Wright, and Dr. Fox, if you would raise your right hands?
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Shays. Gentlemen, I am sorry that you have had to wait
so long. We started at 2. Probably this one we should have had
only two panels. But I would like you both to be able to make a
statement before we break, and if you would be so kind as to
allow us to vote and then finish with our questions, that would
be appreciated.
Mr. Mandigo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. It is Mr. Mandigo?
Mr. Mandigo. That is correct, sir.
Mr. Shays. Mr. Mandigo, you have the floor.
STATEMENTS OF CHARLEY MANDIGO, DIRECTOR, FLEET SECURITY,
HOLLAND AMERICA LINE; AND CAPTAIN WILLIAM S. WRIGHT, SENIOR
VICE PRESIDENT, MARINE OPERATIONS, ROYAL CARIBBEAN
INTERNATIONAL, ACCOMPANIED BY JAMES FOX, NORTHEASTERN
UNIVERSITY, THE LIPMAN FAMILY PROFESSOR OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE
STATEMENT OF CHARLEY MANDIGO
Mr. Mandigo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for inviting me here before your
subcommittee a second time. I believe that I was here in
December. My name is Charlie Mandigo. I am the director of
Fleet Security for Holland America Line. Holland America Line
is a subsidiary company of Carnival Corp., which encompasses
Carnival Cruise Lines, Princess, Costa, Holland America Line,
Windstar, and a couple other companies. My position also is a
company security officer for Holland America Line.
I have been employed by Holland America for 3 years in the
position, and prior to that, I was employed by the FBI for 27
years and had retired as a special agent in charge of the
Seattle office of the FBI. In that position, I was responsible
for all crimes underneath the FBI's jurisdiction to include
terrorism, crimes on the high seas, and other matters.
In that 27-year career, as all of us see in the media, it
rapidly became clear to me that crime can occur in every
segment of society, regardless of where we were. In that
capacity, and switching careers from one to another, and prior
to my employment with Holland America Line I had never been on
a cruise ship, but looking at the numbers that my expectation
would be that I would look at the possibility of spending a
significant amount of my time handling crime on cruise ships.
Much to my satisfaction in this when I came to the cruise
line and supervising these matters throughout Holland America
that has 12 cruise ships, I found a very low incidence of crime
compared to what my expectation was. And what I did find was a
significant amount of our time was spent looking at proactive
measures on board cruise ships to try to avoid crime. And we
have many measures in place on cruise ships to deter crime, to
minimize crime, and we do an extraordinarily good job on that.
Unfortunately, when we are dealing with a large number of
people, as any large number of people in any segment of our
population, there are always going to be incidents that occur
that are tragic and are unfortunate. And I know in my
experience of law enforcement where I handled child abductions,
kidnappings, and other matters, some of them did not turn out
well. Always the most difficult part of the job was dealing
with victims, in that they are very tearing, they are very
tragic, and very difficult to deal with. And all victims on
this, we would extend our condolences to. But it is our
objective to provide a safe and secure place for all of our
guests on board our cruise ships.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. Thank you, Mr. Mandigo.
Captain Wright. You need to hit the button there. There you
go.
Captain Wright. Technology.
Mr. Shays. Great. Thank you, sir.
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STATEMENT OF WILLIAM S. WRIGHT
Captain Wright. Chairman Shays and members of the
subcommittee, my name is Bill Wright. I am the senior vice
president of Marine Operations for Royal Caribbean
International, a global cruise vacation company operating 19
ships. Our sister brand is Celebrity Cruises, which operates
nine ships worldwide. I am pleased to be here today to provide
testimony on behalf of our two cruise lines and our parent
corporation, Royal Caribbean Cruises, Limited.
I have more than 30 years of seafaring experience. I have
worked for Royal Caribbean International for nearly 14 years,
including serving as Master on a number of the ships in our
fleet. In my current role, I am responsible for the maritime
operations of the Royal Caribbean International fleet. I was
born and raised in south Florida.
All of us at Royal Caribbean appreciate the time and
serious consideration that you are applying to these hearings.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
Captain Wright. We hope that they will improve the public's
understanding of our industry, and we particularly appreciate
you giving us this opportunity to appear before you to answer
the subcommittees questions.
There are clearly a lot of emotions surrounding the issues
being raised here today, and our hearts go out to everyone here
who has suffered a loss. But it is important that the facts and
only the facts drive decisionmaking by interested parties and
that the media not be used to distort the facts or to get in
the way of law enforcement investigations in their search for
the truth. It is important to the public, the cruise industry,
and to Royal Caribbean that we discuss the facts completely,
accurately, and in context.
My written testimony addresses in detail issues related to
the hiring and training of our staff, guest behavior policies,
and crime reporting policies. Due to my limited time today, I
will touch briefly on those issues and respond to those raised
by others who have been asked to testify today.
Providing a safe environment begins with hiring and
training of our crew members, including crime reporting
procedures, our safety policies regarding guests, and crew
member behavior. Our U.S. and foreign national crew member
applicants are screened carefully, and it is our policy not to
hire anyone with a criminal past. Each ship has officers with
specific security responsibilities on board. All crew members,
regardless of their responsibilities, are trained to report any
suspicious condition or activities on board to their superiors,
who are then required to report them up the chain of command.
Our policies and training require diligent reporting of
alleged crimes to the FBI and other law enforcement
authorities. The FBI has identified for the cruise line
industry those allegations of potential crimes it wants
reported. We not only report what the FBI requests, but we
often report additional allegations that fall below FBI
thresholds or what otherwise would not be reported in a land-
based environment.
Perhaps this is why FBI Agent John DiPaolo, who oversees
criminal investigations for south Florida seaports, said the
following about the cruise industry's crime reporting track
record in the Miami Herald story on February 12, 2006, and I
believe the quote is to our right and to your left: ```We have
very open lines of communication,' DiPaolo said. `We've never
had an instance where I went to them and said, Hey, you should
have reported that to us.' ''
In many cases, we give the FBI more than it requests. As a
result, the FBI often declines to investigate allegations of
crimes below certain thresholds. In other words, we report
incidents to the FBI even though they fall below the thresholds
the FBI has established for industry reporting. We have also in
place strong and effective policies that establish appropriate
behavior for crew members and guests, including crew member
interaction with guests. We enforce these policies up to and
including expulsion from the ship or termination of employment.
Today, you have heard testimony from others regarding
individual experiences on our cruise ships. We at Royal
Caribbean and Celebrity Cruises extend our deepest sympathies
to the Carver family for their loss, and we regret that one of
our guests, the Leonards, reported that something was stolen
while sailing with us.
While we deeply regret that our guests had experiences they
shared with the subcommittee, we should not lose sight of the
facts surrounding these incidents, which represent less than
one-tenth of 1 percent of our guests' experiences.
The case of Ms. Carver is particularly tragic. We regret
that the Carver family has experienced this inconsolable loss.
We know now that one of our supervisors was notified by a room
steward that Ms. Carver was missing from her cabin.
Unfortunately, and tragically, that supervisor did not
recognize the significance of her absence and never reported it
to his superior, as he should have done. This was wrong and
inexcusable. He exercised poor judgment and we fired him as a
result.
I also regret that, due to the supervisor's failure to
notify his superiors, we didn't realize that Ms. Carver was
missing and, therefore, no one from our company had the chance
to personally inform the Carver family about her disappearance.
Could we have done anything different to save Ms. Carver
from apparently committing suicide? We have searched our minds
and hearts to second-guess ourselves on that. Sadly, the facts
appear that Ms. Carver went on this cruise with the intent to
commit suicide. Ms. Carver purchased her passage only 2 days
before the ship's departure from Seattle and boarded with only
the clothes she was wearing, two purses, and an envelope
containing a computer disk. These are not items that would
prepare her or anyone else for a 7-night Alaska cruise.
Mr. Leonard alleged that some of his wife's belonging were
stolen from his cabin. We are genuinely sorry for their loss.
It is noteworthy, however, that the Leonards declined to use a
safe deposit box available on board because, as Mrs. Leonard
has stated, she did not want to be inconvenienced. The Leonards
have also declined travel insurance. And just if this jewelry
had been lost at a hotel while on land, Mrs. Leonard could have
filed suit against the company for her loss. But they have
never exercised that right. Had the Leonards taken advantage of
our security precautions, Mrs. Leonard's jewelry would have
been secure.
And, finally, I would like to add that our hearts continue
to go out to Jennifer Hagel-Smith and the Smith family over the
disappearance of George Smith. I was personally very happy that
I for the first time have had the opportunity to meet Mr. and
Mrs. Smith and Bree Smith and extend my condolences for their
tremendous loss.
I think it is important for the purpose of this
subcommittee just to state that in this instance, as in other
instances, our reporting of the disappearance of George Smith
was expeditious and complete, and an investigation has been
conducted, a thorough one, and we continue to cooperate
entirely with the FBI.
I thank you for this opportunity, and I am happy to take
any questions.
[The prepared statement of Captain Wright follows:]
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Mr. Shays. Thank you very much. I am going to let my
colleague jump in, but I just want to ask you, Captain Wright,
are you comfortable with--I believe sincerely that with the
case of Mr. Carver and his daughter Merrian, that you all
deeply regret what happened. But I don't hear any regret for
the problems he still encountered in trying to get information.
That is where I am having my big disconnect with your company.
It would seem to me that the way you would best express your
sorrow is to do--almost have a situation team, it has been
suggested, to say how can we help you in any way, get the
information you need to get--etc.
So, maybe you could respond to that.
Captain Wright. Certainly. It is my understanding that we
did our best once we were aware of the disappearance of Mrs.
Carver, and it was tragic that the chain of command broke down.
It was a clear error chain. Things went wrong, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. No, but in terms of talking to employees and
stuff like that, they weren't given the access to do that. I am
just curious why.
Captain Wright. Oh. Well, my understanding, Mr. Chairman,
is that they were. We actually designated a vice president of
the corporation, Mrs. Lynn White, who is responsible for
overseeing these types of issues, to personally take that case.
We provided the Carvers with information that was voluntary. We
also replied to subpoenas that Mr. Carver mentioned in his
testimony. So I am not sitting here with the opinion that we
have been as incooperative as Mr. Carver indicated.
Mr. Shays. So let me put it in a positive and then give it
to Mr. Kucinich. Are you saying that you provided all the
information that the Carver family has asked for, or some of
the information?
Captain Wright. Yes, I believe we have attempted to be
cooperative and I believe that we--my understanding is that we
have provided information voluntarily above what was requested
in----
Mr. Shays. Are you aware of any information that you have
not provided that they have requested?
Captain Wright. No, I am not.
Mr. Shays. OK. Mr. Kucinich.
Mr. Kucinich. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to ask both Mr. Mandigo and Captain Wright,
since it has already been established that you don't keep
records for the purpose of police reporting, you just turn
things over to the FBI, at least with respect to any crimes
that are committed within the United States, I have a question
generally. Do you keep records for insurance purposes? Mr.
Mandigo.
Mr. Mandigo. I don't know what in reference you are making
that to, Mr. Kucinich.
Mr. Kucinich. Well, you know, if you have incidents on your
ships, do you keep records for insurance purposes of those
incidents?
Mr. Mandigo. As a matter of routine, we would keep those
records. Now, if at a future date it becomes relevant to
insurance, then that record may be there. And we do not--we
don't keep records specifically in anticipation of insurance.
We keep records as a matter of routine and operational
procedures.
Mr. Kucinich. See, I just wonder, you know, if throughout
this hearing this is one area that would be fruitful to
explore, Mr. Chairman. Because people have testified earlier
there has been a concern about certain things not being
reported. And the implication is that there is a lack of
incident recordkeeping and reporting by the cruise line
industries. We have heard from the FBI and the Coast Guard they
don't keep track of the number of incidents on cruise ships. I
would think that just for insurance purposes companies would
need to keep records of criminal acts.
And so I want to ask you again. Do you have records of the
criminal acts that have taken place on your ships?
Mr. Mandigo. We have records--anything that is reported to
us, you know, through our front desk on our cruise ships is
reported as a matter of record.
Mr. Kucinich. And this is a matter between you and the
insurance companies first?
Mr. Mandigo. No, it is not for insurance companies, it is
for our own operational procedures.
Mr. Kucinich. Do you keep records and you file reports with
your insurers as to the incidents that take place on your
ships?
Mr. Mandigo. You are asking about a matter that I do not
have expertise in as far as, you know, what is filed for
insurance claim or not an insurance claim.
Mr. Kucinich. Can you see that this subcommittee receives
all reports of incidents, criminal incidents, that have
occurred on your ships that have been filed with insurance
companies?
Captain Wright. I am sure that those records are there.
They are--it is not my area of work. That inquiry would have to
be directed elsewhere.
Mr. Kucinich. Captain Wright.
Captain Wright. Congressman, I would agree with the
statement that was just made, that we keep a wide variety of
records. I think your scrutiny of the----
Mr. Kucinich. Are your ships insured?
Captain Wright. Of course our ships are insured.
Mr. Kucinich. Do you have liability insurance for acts that
take place?
Captain Wright. Yes, we do.
Mr. Kucinich. Do you have out-of-court settlements that are
directed, for instance----
Captain Wright. I have no knowledge of that. I would assume
we do, yes. That is an area that is handled by our risk
management people. I would not be aware of the details. But
certainly our ships are insured.
Mr. Kucinich. Mr. Chairman, I think that there is just
another way at which you can get information, that the
subcommittee can gain information about what is going on on
these ships. And that is to go after the records and the
communications between the company and their insurers.
If you are telling the insurance companies what is going
on, there has to be records. Now, if things are going on and
you are not telling the insurance companies, I am sure the
insurance companies are going to be very interested in that,
because that would affect what you are paying for your
insurance. And it also could, you know, raise some interesting
other questions that are legal in nature.
So I think--and the work of the committee, which I know is
ongoing, Mr. Chairman, I thought I would point out to you that
it would be helpful for the committee's work to get the records
of communications between the cruise lines and the insurance
companies.
Finally, Mr. Chairman--I know we are getting close to a
vote here--I have from the Web site of the Royal Caribbean
Lines a page here that talks about their environmental safety
and security committee charter. I would like to submit it for
the record. It says, under ``Safety and Security,'' this
committee that they have set up shall review safety and
security programs and policies on board the corporation's
cruise ships; the committee shall review with management
significant safety and security incidents on board the
corporation's cruise ships and obtain reports from members of
management as the committee deems necessary or desirable in
connection with the corporation's safety and security matters.
I would like to submit this for the record, and I would
suggest to the subcommittee that we also gain copies of those
reports. They might be really instructive as to what is
actually going on on that line and any similar reports that
might be available on any other line.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
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Mr. Shays. Gentlemen, I am going to make a request that, if
you don't mind staying until after the vote, if you would look
over--and my staff will give it to you--the recommendations
that were presented to this subcommittee by the International
Cruise Victims Association. What I would like is for you to
tell me what you think is being done right now, what you think
would be totally impractical or impractical, what you think
would be very expensive--and let us judge that--and what you
think might have merit, whether we require it or whether you
all did it.
This is the first hearing I have ever conducted where I
have asked people to stay after a night vote hearing, and I
apologize. I hope it will be the last.
Dr. Fox. Will you want me to testify afterwards?
Mr. Shays. Right. You know, Dr. Fox, I am sorry, I thought
you were accompanying, and ``accompanying'' means you don't
testify. So I apologize. That is the understanding. But I am
happy to have you answer and respond to any questions that we
have, OK?
So we will have a temporary adjournment.
[Recess.]
Mr. Shays. The subcommittee will come to order.
Let me just revise what I said before I just ran out. Dr.
Fox, we had you down as accompanying Captain Wright, but we are
happy to take testimony, particularly given that it is a little
after 7 at night and you have been here all day. So your
testimony is welcomed, valued, and we will look forward to
hearing from you.
Dr. Fox. Thank you. And I believe there was also some
written testimony which has already been submitted. Very short,
so perhaps lost in the shuffle of the large documents.
Mr. Shays. It doesn't have to be short. You give your
testimony as you want.
Dr. Fox. Oh, my verbal testimony will be short as well--not
just given the hour, but it is short. And I thank you for
listening to me and apologize for the confusion about the
agenda.
Mr. Chairman, my name is James Allen Fox. I don't mind the
fact that there was this oversight, not at all. The only thing
I minded tonight was when someone made reference to the fox
guarding the henhouse. I took a personal affront to that.
I am the Lipman Family Professor of Criminal Justice at
Northeastern University in Boston. I think I heard that you
were from Boston originally, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. I wasn't from Boston and I wasn't from Hartford;
I was closer to New York City, which makes me a suspect Yankee.
Dr. Fox. OK. I thought I heard Boston earlier, so I thought
we would speak the same language here.
Mr. Shays. No, what I was explaining is Mr. Lynch had no
trouble hearing our witness from Ireland; I needed a little
translation.
Dr. Fox. OK.
My specialty is crime statistics and crime measurement. I
have several graduate degrees--doctorate, a couple of masters.
One of the masters degrees is in mathematical statistics,
besides the masters and doctorate in criminology. Among my
books, I also have written seven statistics texts. I was the
founding editor of the Journal of Quantitative Criminology,
which is the most prestigious quantitative journal in our
discipline. I am also a fellow at the Department of Justice
Bureau of Statistics, maintaining much of the data on homicide.
I point that out in terms of my role here, which is essentially
to discuss and comment, and perhaps validate, on some of the
measurements that have been made about the risk.
I have also testified on 12 other occasions here in the
Congress, so it is nice to be back. This time I am back at the
request of the International Council on Cruise Lines and
specifically to examine and comment on some of the numbers that
have floated around--no pun intended--about crimes on board
ships.
Before I make my comments, I did listen and I was somewhat
interested in the exchange earlier about Mr. Rivkind's
testimony and whether Mr. Mica had heard it correctly or not
heard it correctly. Actually, I heard it a little bit
differently. I thought he had said that it is not about the
statistics. Which to me meant that he wasn't saying statistics
aren't important but that it is really an issue of human
suffering and tragedy. And I do understand that and I feel
quite strongly, as others do here, that we shouldn't lose sight
of the tragedy and loss and suffering amidst all the numbers.
Yet it is also interesting, in Mr. Rivkind's oral and
written testimony he does say, ``There has been increasing
numbers of criminal activity aboard ships.'' And being a
numbers person and a quantoid, I sort of looked for some tables
that--there are none. And I do wonder how he does make the
statement about there being an increasing number of crimes. I
suppose he just feels that since there is more ridership, more
passengership, there would be more crimes, but that is an open
question.
I did look at some of the data. And while of course there
is virtually no place----
Mr. Shays. Could I just ask? I have asked all the other
witnesses who testified in the last panel if they represented
any interest. Are you being in any way paid by the cruise line
industry? Are you representing them because--I think the
feeling was that not that what you say isn't valid, but I just
want to know. You are not an indifferent source here. You are
paid by the industry or not?
Dr. Fox. I am being paid as a consultant by the industry,
yes.
Mr. Shays. Right. But I respect that you are here with your
expertise and your knowledge and the requirements that go with
it, and I thank you.
Dr. Fox. Yes. And indeed, the request from the industry was
for me to look at some statistics and do some analyses of those
numbers and see what they find.
Now, if the findings--like I don't know if I would be here,
but I am here and I shall see. I stand behind these
calculations whether I am paid or not paid.
Mr. Shays. Fair enough. Thank you.
Dr. Fox. Now of course there is virtually no place on land
or on sea that is totally risk-free. Still, Americans traveling
aboard the major cruise lines that service this country can be
assured of their personal safety.
Now, as you know, Mr. Chairman, it is a very difficult task
to try to derive a statistical matchmate or a standard for
assessing the relative risk of crime on board a cruise ship
versus some other location like a local community. A cruise
ship is an atypical location. It is an atypical composition of
people. It is not representative of any city in terms of age,
race, and gender and level of affluence. And indeed, the
climate on board a ship is sometimes quite spirited and not at
all like the day-to-day work environment that people have in
their homes and their home neighborhoods.
Regardless of the methodological complexities that make it
difficult to strike these comparisons, what I did find is that
the number of reported serious crimes aboard cruise ships is
extremely low no matter what benchmark or standard you use.
Now, compared against a home community, passengers have an
appreciably lower risk of sexual assault and robbery while
enjoying a vacation cruise.
Now, I recognize, as you pointed out, Mr. Chairman, that it
is very difficult to take some of these raw numbers about how
many millions of passengers there are and translate that into a
comparison with a community. But I think you have done it
correctly when you say about 200,000 would be the appropriate
number. And indeed, in the table that is attached to my written
testimony, I do essentially that. I take the 31-plus million
passengers over a 3-year period of time and turn that into a--
number of about 10 million and convert that by essentially
multiplying by 6.9----
Mr. Shays. I don't have your testimony.
Dr. Fox. OK. You don't?
Mr. Shays. No.
Dr. Fox. It is over there.
Mr. Shays. OK, the press has it but the subcommittee
doesn't. So we are going to see if someone will get that for
us.
Dr. Fox. So essentially I take that number, 10 million,
multiply by the average length of a cruise, which is 6.9 days,
divide that by 52, to essentially convert the ridership, the
passengership on board to an annualized number comparable to
the fact that you live in your home community virtually year-
round. And there are indeed not quite 200,000, but 195,000-
196,000 passengers, once you make that adjustment to give you a
full-time annual equivalent.
Adding in the size of the crew, because they can of course
be victims of crime as well as perpetrators, you come up with a
total population figure.
That, then, I take the number of sexual assaults--and I
remove the cases of what is called sexual contact, which is not
truly a rape--I try to get at the numbers of rapes as well as
the number of robberies for the cruise lines and that
population that I have calculated--which turns out to be
281,000 on an annual basis including crew and passengers,
converted to full-time equivalent--and convert that into a
crime rate and compare it to what the crime rate is in the
United States for forcible rape and robbery.
And for forcible rape, what you essentially see is that the
rate of rape on board ships on cruises is about half that of
the national average.
Now, in terms of robbery--and I want to point out there is
a little bit of distinction and clarity about this that is
needed. In the last panel, there was discussion about thefts of
10,000 or more and thefts that are lower than 10,000. And once
in a while the word ``robbery'' was used by a witness. And
these are robberies. In fact, I believe the request had to do
with robberies, which is a confrontation between a victim and
the robber. There is a personal confrontation, there is
intimidation, threat----
Mr. Shays. As opposed to theft?
Dr. Fox. As opposed to theft, when the victim is somewhere
else and their property is taken. This is robbery, not theft.
Theft involves your property being taken unlawfully by someone
when there is no intimidation, no personal confrontation
between you and the perpetrator. Robbery is when someone
confronts you, demands money----
Mr. Shays. Yes, we get it. We get it.
Dr. Fox. OK. And comparing the incidence of sexual
assault--rape--and robbery on board cruise ships per 100,000
population, comparing that to the United States where you do
find that, as I said, for sexual assault the rate is half that
of the United States. And for robbery, it is a tiny, tiny
fraction. Robberies essentially don't happen very often on
board cruise ships. And that makes sense because of the very
confined area, where it is very difficult for an offender to
get away, and the relatively secure environment that you find
on board ship compared to your local community.
So to conclude here, I think that the comparison with
lightning that was struck--again, pardon the pun--before, I
think, is quite telling. There are four sexual assaults per
million passengers. So when someone buys a ticket on a cruise
line, there's four----
Mr. Shays. Wait a second. Why do you then go to a million
passengers? Why wouldn't you say so many sexual assaults--this
is over a 3-year period or--I mean, wouldn't it be over
200,000, not a million?
Dr. Fox. This is when--what is the chance that when you buy
and ticket and you are going to spend a week on a cruise----
Mr. Shays. Oh, I see. OK.
Dr. Fox. When you buy a ticket and spend a week on the
cruise, what is the chance that you will be sexually assaulted
in that week? An individual.
Mr. Shays. OK, fair enough. So we are not comparing to
towns right now, we are--that is not--OK.
Dr. Fox. Right. I am just comparing to the weather. When
you buy a ticket for a cruise, you have a 4 in 1 million chance
of being sexually assaulted. That is identical to the chance of
being struck by lightning.
Now, of course, we don't go out in a rainstorm when we take
that----
Mr. Shays. Wait a second. Wait a second. Isn't lightning
over a stretch of a year?
Dr. Fox. Yes.
Mr. Shays. This is not a stretch over a year. This is 1
week.
Dr. Fox. It is the time period for which you are on that
cruise. Now, if you spend every day on the cruise and you take
a year-long cruise, obviously your chances increase, but most
Americans don't spend a year on a boat, on a ship, they spend a
week.
Mr. Shays. I know, but I just wondered if you are being
fair with your comparison right now. Maybe I am just not
getting it, but it seems to me you have to multiply times 52.
Dr. Fox. Except it also doesn't rain every day either. So
there are a lot of days in the year when you have no chance of
being struck.
The reason I bring this up is just people have a sense
that, yes, there is a certain risk of lightning striking you.
But it is a risk that we sort of deal with, we take reasonable
precautions in a rainstorm and a thunder-and-lightning storm.
And all I am saying here is that, yes, there is a risk of
sexual assault--4 in a million; there is a risk of robbery,
which is a very tiny risk, much, much smaller than that. We
can't--there is probably no place where there is zero risk, but
these are rather low numbers.
Mr. Shays. See--yes, OK. Keep going.
Dr. Fox. Well, that is really what I have to say, is that
when you adjust for exposure time, the chance of being
assaulted on a cruise ship is extremely slim.
Mr. Shays. Yes. I am not comfortable with the statistics.
So your going through the statistics with me is partially
valid, but there is another part that hasn't bought into the
fact that they are legit. But we will satisfy ourselves. I
don't know how long it will take, but we will satisfy ourselves
either they are legitimate or they are not.
I used to be in the Peace Corps in the Fiji Islands. There
were cruise ships that would come and go. And it was a duty-
free goods port. I was made aware that people would buy cameras
at the very end and think they were getting an F-stop that was
lower than what they were getting, and they would get on board
the ship and the ship is about to go. It is just a different--
you know, and they couldn't run back and quickly exchange and
they overpaid and all that stuff.
I just have the feeling that a lot of people don't report
it because, the next day they are off or that afternoon they
leave. Then they may report it later, but it doesn't get
reported by the cruise industry. I just think there are a lot
of other factors that come into play. It is a suspicion.
But I would concede that if the statistics are accurate,
the numbers are pretty low. I think that a witness like Ms.
Kelly would not show up on the radar screen. And I think that
when we talk about George Smith, if he was killed he would be
called ``missing'' and not ``killed.'' So I just have problems.
Dr. Fox. Well, also, in Greenwich, CT, which I think--is
that your area? If rapes occur, they are not always reported
either. There are many reasons why victims of crime don't
report it. That could happen on land and on sea.
[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. Shays. I just wonder, though, if the nature of just
being on board a week means that sometimes things just don't
get reported that would if they were on board for a month,
would have gotten reported. It is like, what's the point, I am
leaving tomorrow, who the heck do I speak with, and, and, and.
So at any rate, I am just telling you what I think and I am
just a little suspicious of the statistics. Now we have Mr.
Kaye who said, you know, they are required by law to report it.
Yet we have the Government telling us they are not required by
law to report it. That raises questions.
So at any rate, thank you for your points about the
statistics. At this time I am going to have Dr. Palarino just
ask you a few questions for the record and then I am going to
go through this document that I asked you to look at.
Dr. Palarino. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just have quick
questions for Mr. Mandigo and Captain Wright.
I have heard talk about a risk management office. Could you
both explain what a risk management office is and what it does?
Mr. Mandigo. Well, I have very little to do with the risk
management office, but it is basically the people that would
handle, as I understand it, the people that are making claims
against the company. Not litigation, but people that, you know,
feel that they have some grievance with the company. There may
be damage to equipment that, where we have insurance, where it
would be repaired. That is my understanding of what those
people do.
Dr. Palarino. Captain Wright.
Captain Wright. Very much the same thing. We have a risk
management department. It is a very large department that has a
multitude of responsibilities. They are responsible for our
insurance. They are responsible for the operation, the running
of our medical facilities. They maintain a 24-7 watch system in
terms of the ship's need to contact shoreside either for
notification purposes, for--quite often and most regularly--for
the coordination of a medical evacuation, which occurs with
some degree of regularity. That is the number that we can call
from the ship and be guaranteed that somebody is there who
knows the procedures, has the telephone numbers, has the
contacts, and can respond.
Dr. Palarino. So the victims and the victims' families that
testified on panel one, each one of those would have had some
type of risk management associated with their incident. Is that
a correct statement?
Captain Wright. It depends on how it comes through the
system, that it may have come in. If they filed a civil suit,
lawsuit, then it is not going to go to risk management, it is
going to go through a legal counsel, outside counsel, however
it is handled. But they come in and make a claim against the
company, yes, it would go to the risk management people.
Dr. Palarino. So it wouldn't have gone to the risk
management people initially. Is that a correct statement?
Captain Wright. Well, quite possibly it could have.
Dr. Palarino. It could have gone----
Captain Wright. Yes, we would have--depending on the
incident that we are referring to, we would provide the
information, the contact information to the guest saying that
when you get ashore, here is the contact number to followup
this incident further.
Dr. Palarino. Thank you.
Mr. Gorsline mentioned a casualty assistance team. Are you
familiar with that team or concept?
Mr. Mandigo. I am familiar with what that concept is.
Dr. Palarino. What would a casualty assistance team be?
Mr. Mandigo. Basically a casualty assistance team would be
a component of a crisis management plan, and that is when you
have something happen, that you have designated people that
would respond to that particular situation.
Dr. Palarino. Is that same for Royal Caribbean?
Captain Wright. That is correct. But I think we need to
characterize it in the framework of being something of a larger
event, where we need a lot of people at a scene to be able to
deal with it. A ship was delayed, for example, coming in, if
there were something other, not an individual incident
occurring on board.
Dr. Palarino. Would Mr. Mulvaney have been assigned a
casualty assistance team?
Mr. Mandigo. I mean, that is a----
Dr. Palarino. He told me he was.
Mr. Mandigo. Yes, and I say it is a mixed question. I mean,
it just depends on a variety of circumstances.
Dr. Palarino. Were the other victims or victims' families
assigned a casualty assistance team?
Mr. Mandigo. Not all victims would be assigned a, as you
call it, a victim casualty team or whatever. They may be
assigned a person in the company as an individual that would
look after them, but not necessarily a formal-type process.
Dr. Palarino. OK. That is all I have, Mr. Chairman. Thank
you.
Mr. Shays. Thank you.
This document that you all have looked at, the
International Cruise Victims Association suggestions, they have
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 categories from background
checks, the international police, security, crime scenes,
structural enhancement, video surveillance, access security
bracelets, missing or overboard passengers, rape kits, rape
reporting, excursions sold and promoted, cruise lines'
accountability, and U.S. Congress intervention.
Tell me the area that you already do or come closest to
doing. Which category would you say is already being covered in
some degree?
Mr. Mandigo. We already do parts of backgrounds. Security
crime scenes, we essentially do all of the security crime
scenes----
Mr. Shays. I could say you do almost all of these to some
degree already.
Mr. Mandigo. That is correct. On security crime scenes, we
effectively do all of these. For instance, we were talking
there may be, you know, this particular check-off list, we may
or may not be doing, but we are essentially doing everything on
that list.
Mr. Shays. Do you take pictures of the crime scene?
Mr. Mandigo. Yes.
Mr. Shays. You have an official photographer who does that?
Mr. Mandigo. We have photographers aboard the ship, and
that is part of the procedure, is to photograph the crime
scene.
Mr. Shays. Any other areas that you would say you are
already doing?
Mr. Mandigo. The video cameras, I mean, we do in part, not
all. The rape kits, we do all of what the rape kits currently
does have reported there.
Mr. Shays. Let's go through that, then, if you say you do
all. And it is not a long list. It says doctors who have a
license to practice medicine must be available 24 hours, 7.
That is true.
No request should be refused or taken lightly. That would
be a matter of judgment.
Written documentation to be provided, signed and issued to
the point. That probably you do?
Mr. Mandigo. Yes.
Mr. Shays. Any other area that you think you cover pretty
well on this list?
Mr. Mandigo. Other areas that we may have small parts of,
but not necessarily in a majority or in total.
Mr. Shays. What is the area that would be the most
difficult to do in terms of being practical. Forget dollars
right now. And I am Captain Wright as well to join in.
Captain Wright. Sure. All right, well, I will start off. I
would say the access security bracelets. The microchips,
positive identification.
Mr. Shays. I am sorry, where are we at now?
Captain Wright. Page 2, Access Security Bracelets.
Mr. Shays. Yes, OK.
Captain Wright. I think it is pretty clear that while one
could conceive that would perhaps provide some benefit, there
are a lot of civil liberties issues and would be certainly
something that is almost unprecedented in any other
application.
Mr. Shays. Let me just ask. Some folks, what goes in Las
Vegas, stays in Las Vegas. The sense is you want to give people
a sense of privacy. If someone goes from one cabin to another
or something, you don't need someone tracking, hey, this guy
went to that cabin and this person went to this cabin, or two
couples swapped or whatever.
Captain Wright. Sure. I think that is a reasonable
position, yes,
Mr. Shays. I am giving that as an example, but there could
be a lot of examples.
Captain Wright. Right. The technology is there. Clearly
today it is doable. It is used in all kinds of industrial
applications.
Mr. Shays. It is mostly a privacy issue?
Captain Wright. Yes, I would say so.
Mr. Shays. OK. What would be another area?
Captain Wright. I think there probably are some--and I am
not the expert, but I think from a jurisdictional perspective,
we discussed this with marshals. I mean, certainly if you had
marshals on board, they would perhaps have some jurisdiction on
a certain segment of the ship's population, but due to our
international makeup on a typical cruise, both of our guests
and of our crew members, they would most likely not have
authority for enforcement of anything with a certain percentage
of the crew members or passengers.
Mr. Shays. Are most of the folks who are on a cruise ship
Americans? I mean, are they the predominant number?
Mr. Mandigo. Yes. I mean, we have a subsidiary line out of
Europe where, when they sail in Europe, a majority of the
passengers would not be American. But for the most part, they
are U.S. citizens.
Mr. Shays. What do you think is--I realize you can't speak
for your company in--well, maybe you can somewhat. But what are
the areas that you found the most intriguing? I mean, would you
agree that this is a fairly good list?
Captain Wright. Yes, it is an excellent document, as you
earlier said. I think it is----
Mr. Shays. Just give me a taste of something that you might
feel was a logical--whether it is required by the Government or
whether you decide to do it, if you were to take this list to
your folks and say, you know, there is some merit here, I would
kind of like--you know, am intrigued by this idea, what would
be those areas that you might see that?
Mr. Mandigo. One intriguing area, and of course this is,
again, that authority that cruise lines don't have is this
proposal on marshals. I mean, that is clearly well outside the
scope of the cruise lines.
Captain Wright. Mr. Chairman, I would agree. I would say
that the upgrading--and we are in the process of doing that on
an ongoing basis--of both the technologies that we are using
and the number of CCTV cameras that are positioned around the
ship is an area that I am sure we could improve on. Although we
have hundreds and hundreds of cameras presently on board the
ships, I think an audit and a review of the areas--again, going
back to certain privacy issues--that we could perhaps increase
some of the coverage on the vessels.
Mr. Shays. I mean, bottom line is you are not going to have
a camera on someone's individual balcony.
Captain Wright. No, clearly not.
Mr. Mandigo. No.
Mr. Shays. But I would think in the places where other
people would have access in public, then there would be a logic
to the fact that you could have, and probably do have, a number
of cameras.
Mr. Mandigo. Correct.
Captain Wright. Correct.
Mr. Shays. I would appreciate it if both your companies
would--I am requesting a more formal response in writing to
this document because we would be looking at this document as a
discussion vehicle.
Captain Wright. Sure.
Mr. Shays. If you could provide a response in the next 3 to
4 weeks, that would be helpful.
Captain Wright. Absolutely.
Mr. Shays. Dr. Fox, did you want to say something?
Dr. Fox. I was going to add something, because I heard
earlier a discussion of changing some of the statistical
criteria for what is to be reported and what is not to be
reported. May I make a comment about that?
Mr. Shays. Absolutely.
Dr. Fox. OK. As Mr. Kaye had said previously, it is
somewhat arbitrary as to whether you use $10,000 or $6,000 or
$5,000, but I do urge that if a change is considered, that
there be some reasonable threshold. I mean, for example,
Captain Wright here inadvertently has taken my pen. Now, it is
not really a theft because he had no intent to deprive me of
this. And I am sure on board ship there are sunglasses and
cameras and lots of things get lost and may get reported as
something--someone stole my camera. That maintaining a certain
level of threshold, make sure that what is reported is
substantial. One of the problems that the FBI has had and now
has is that a lion's share of the Part 1 crimes, the serious
crimes, aren't serious. They are larcenies of $25 or $50. You
don't want to be the victim of that, but it is not a homicide.
Mr. Shays. Dr. Fox, I totally agree with you. But I am
struck by the fact that a more significant statistic are not
robberies. I saw you give him back the pen, sir.
Dr. Fox. I am just letting him borrow it.
Mr. Shays. After you basically dissed him. [Laughter.]
I just wanted to make a point. You need counseling. He is
the one who is paying your bill here.
Dr. Fox. Yes.
Mr. Shays. But what seems more logical to me is that a
theft is more significant and more likely on board a ship than
a robbery, and yet thefts are not reported unless they reach to
a level--I mean, they don't appear to be reported.
Dr. Fox. But there should be some level. We should not do
like the FBI did, which is to remove the minimum threshold.
There should be a minimum threshold or else you just are
getting swamped with lots of very small numbers. I mean, lots
of crimes that are very low-level severity. So whether it be
$10,000 or $5,000 or $3,000, some decision can be made, but I
would urge that it be some reasonable threshold.
Mr. Shays. Now, dealing with statistics, we are told that
the industry will go, Dr. Fox, from 10.5 million to 20 million
in about 5 years, which is a huge increase. And Captain Wright,
is that statistic pretty accurate?
Captain Wright. I am not familiar with it myself, but we
are certainly going through some remarkable growth.
Mr. Shays. Let me just say that the statistic that has been
thrown around to us--and maybe ``throw'' is the right word,
because it is an estimate--that it will grow significantly in
the next 5 years, almost double. And if that is true, Dr. Fox,
what is your sense of what happens to the statistics? Do they
go up proportionally, or is it likely that we would see a shift
one way or the other?
Dr. Fox. Well, if nothing different is done in terms of
prevention, then one would expect that as the passenger count,
as the number of--actually, as the number of ships increases in
the--that the crimes on ships would increase. That is the raw
number, the incidents. The rate shouldn't change. Hopefully,
you know, as some of these do make sense and there are other
ideas that the industry implements on their own, that the rate
will decline even as the number of passengers increases.
Mr. Shays. I believe a previous year we were told a
statistic of 13 missing and it has jumped to 24. What happened
to move that number up?
Mr. Mandigo. You increased the number of years, sir, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Shays. I thought it was 3 to 3. Is it----
Mr. Mandigo. Originally it was 2 years.
Mr. Shays. Oh, 2 to 3?
Mr. Mandigo. That is correct.
Mr. Shays. OK, thank you.
Oh, just the last point of questioning. I leave with a
sense that we have gone from saying statistics aren't reported,
that were reported voluntarily, to where there is a law that
requires it. But the industry also led me to believe that it
was voluntary. Is this a change in tactic or a new discovery or
what, in terms of its presentation to this committee, Captain
Wright?
Captain Wright. It appears to me--I was not present during
the first hearing--however, it seems to me it was just a
miscommunication, if you will, that we do have voluntary
standards, we are reporting above and beyond what the law and
the FBI specifically requests, whereas there is a component of
our reporting that is also mandatory, as Mr. Kaye expressed
today.
Mr. Shays. So what we need to sort out as the subcommittee
is what is the legal requirement and what are those
statistics--and Dr. Fox, we may get back to you on that--versus
what they do above and beyond. So what would be helpful is for
both of your companies to tell us what is required by law and
then what you do above and beyond. That would be helpful. And,
you know, within 3 to 4 weeks would be helpful--sooner,
obviously, but--and let me just conclude by saying, so, I have
listened to a lot in this hearing that would tend to add to
your side of the argument, except for the fact that we had six
witnesses who basically felt in very real terms, and I tend to
buy into their view, that they were and still are not treated
with the respect you would want yourselves to be treated if you
were going through the same experience. And so what I would
request is we are going to monitor what kind of problems they
continue to have. Part of our feeling of a sense that you all
are hearing what we are saying is how they are treated. I am
not talking in any way about financial compensation, nothing in
that direction. I am just talking about information that
enables them to understand what happened or didn't happen.
So that would be my request.
Is there any closing comment that anyone wants to make? Dr.
Fox.
Dr. Fox. What I would suggest--now, I am going to add an
item which isn't on this list. And maybe it is done by some
cruise lines, maybe it is not, but I will throw it out. It is
based on my understanding of what we did in the criminal
justice system. Of course, historically it had been problem of
do victims feel like they are being listened to and do they
feel that the criminal justice system cares about their rights?
One of the best things was the development of victim/witness
advocates, essentially individuals who were trained at
communicating, listening to victims. It may not be a bad idea,
when you have a crew size of over 1,000 or 900 or whatever the
number is, that at least one of those individuals be trained as
a victim/witness advocate who specifically understands how to
communicate with victims and be their advocate.
Mr. Shays. You know, I would like to add it to the list
that was presented, because frankly, whether that person is on
board ship would be helpful, an ombudsman--maybe you have
them--but in your company. If the New York Times and other
papers have someone who analyzes how well they are doing to
report the news fairly, it might be, given that you represent,
both of you together, your companies represent a huge part of
the market. You are almost a monopoly in one sense. And I tend
to believe when you get this big, you tend to become a little
insensitive. And this may be a way to deal with some very real
problems and do it on your own without the Government injecting
itself. But someone who would be actually empowered to present
a strong position on the part of the victim to your company.
Captain Wright. Sure.
Mr. Shays. If you would consider that, I think it would be
an interesting idea.
Captain Wright. Mr. Chairman, I think that is an excellent
recommendation. The irony of this entire discussion is that our
whole business, our whole product is treating people fabulously
and making sure they have a great vacation. And the victims who
spoke today and the experiences that they have had, the
tragedies that they have incurred, it is inexcusable from our
side. And each one of them, I believe, had its own element of
wrongdoing on our part, where we did not follow our procedures,
we did not perform as we should have performed. But these
incidences do not represent the bulk of our operations.
We are very proud on the statistics that are out there. And
we are always looking for ways to improve. There is a big part
of our maritime philosophy, if you will, of having a habit of
continuous improvement and looking at lessons learned. And I
can assure you that every one of these events, at least from
our company's perspective, will be analyzed as to where did we
mess up and how can we avoid doing that in the future. Because
it is certainly the last thing that we want to see happen, but
unfortunately there are examples where it has occurred.
Typically, when you go and do an investigation--I know the
NTSB, NASA, the military is very familiar with this--you
discover almost always there is an error chain. Very rarely is
it one single mistake that one single person or crew member
made that resulted in something happening. If you go back and
do the detail work, you are going to find it is a series of
things where the system failed, there was a systemic failure.
And you need to understand that. That is something that we do
on a regular basis, and I think the chairman's subcommittee is
helping to that end.
Mr. Shays. Thank you. Any other comments before we adjourn?
Mr. Mandigo. No, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Shays. Let me again thank you for staying so late and
being so patient. We do appreciate it. And if there are still
any families here who have had some experiences that they would
like for me to know about and my staff, we will just stay
around and talk to you privately about anything that you may
want to tell us.
So with that, this hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 7:47 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
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