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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Sunday, April 1, 2007

Lawmakers asked to better protect cruise passengers

By Raju Chebium
Gannett News Service

A CLOSER LOOK AT THE CASES

From 2002 until February this year:

  • The FBI opened 184 cases involving crimes on cruise ships.

  • Employees were suspects in 84 of them.

  • Sexual assaults were the most frequently reported crime, followed by physical assault.

  • Sixty sexual-assault cases between 2002 and February weren’t prosecuted for reasons such as lack of evidence; in some cases, the investigations showed the accuser and the accused had consensual sex.

  • Most alleged sexual assaults took place in private cabins; alcohol was a factor in about half the cases.

    Source: Testimony by Salvador Hernandez, deputy assistant director, FBI, before the House Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation.

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    WASHINGTON — Critics of the cruise industry urged Congress last week to pass laws to ensure passengers are safe from crimes committed by ship employees, but companies argued rapes, assaults and people falling overboard are rare occurrences the industry is tackling on its own.

    Critics included Laurie Dishman, who's suing Royal Caribbean Cruises, alleging a former employee raped her while she was on a Mexico cruise in February 2006. Federal prosecutors dropped the criminal case, citing a lack of evidence.

    Dishman, 36, of Sacramento, Calif., said cruise employees tampered with the crime scene, downplayed her allegations, failed to quickly notify authorities and refused to provide medical and legal documents.

    "This cruise industry cannot be trusted," she tearfully testified before a House maritime transportation subcommittee. "Not only was I raped, (I had) no sense of where to go, what to do."

    Representatives from the FBI and the U.S. Coast Guard said the difficulty in prosecuting crimes in international waters is that U.S. laws apply only within 12 miles of U.S. shores. Crimes committed outside territorial waters often fall under the jurisdiction of foreign countries with differing legal systems.

    Of the 200 cruise ships operating worldwide, three sail under the U.S. flag. Companies registered in foreign nations such as Liberia own the rest.

    Ross Klein, a Canadian professor who studies the cruise industry, said companies are more interested in preventing bad publicity and less interested in keeping passengers safe.

    Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, said cruise companies "generally" have a safe record.

    "Generally, a safe record is not good enough," Poe said. "One victim is one victim too many."

    Cruise company executives, who stressed passenger safety is their top priority, said the industry has strong security procedures such as requiring every employee on ships doing business in the United States to undergo federal background checks. Crewmembers receive security training endorsed by the FBI and Coast Guard, they said.

    Gary Bald, who handles security for Royal Caribbean Cruises, said the company failed in some ways to help Dishman. He outlined a number of other steps the company is taking, such as spending $25 million on new surveillance cameras and working with victims groups to improve sensitivity training for ship personnel.

    "We're not perfect, although we're striving to be," Bald said.