Hey there, folks. It is Friday, April tenth, and his own friend haint By in his story. But that welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ. Rose. We've kept a close eye on this story from the moment we heard that a Michigan woman went overboard and a dinghy with her husband in the Bahamas. He's now been arrested. We heard from the woman's daughter, who raids some questions.
Now we are hearing from his friend, the accused friends, who quite frankly robes some of the stuff he said is more damning than anything we've heard so far.
Yes, this was fascinating.
First of all, why his friend would share these text messages he received from Brian Hooker, who, yes, has been under arrest since Wednesday in the disappearance of his wife, fifty five year old Lynette Hooker. He has not been charged yet, we should point out and police it's a little interesting what the Behamian officials said, but they said they had forty eight hours to either charge him or
release him. That would be at some point today, But then they added they can also extend that for another ninety six hours if they think it's necessary, so he could be behind bars for a few more days before charges are filed. But these new text messages, whoo, they say a lot.
And right now this case is a case of he said, and she can't say anything because she is presumed dead. This is a search and recovery at this point. But this was last Saturday. Robes Brian Hooker fifty eight and Lynette Hooker fifty five, fifty five. They've been married now, how long?
Twenty five years?
All right, So they go out in the boat. These are avid boat they know what they're doing on the water. His story is they go out on the water around sundown. She some kind of way falls over into the water. They get separated. He couldn't recover her. She has the key to the boat on her when she goes into the water, according to him, and then he has to essentially paddle back to shore. Took several hours. That's his
story and he's sticking to it. Robes. Not long after that, the daughter of Lynnette started speaking and saying, this doesn't make She didn't flat out of cues, but she at least raised some questions. Okay, that catches us up. He is now in custody. His friend has now done in an interview Roads with CBS News and shared text messages he said he got from Brian Hooker after this whole accident. Now, I will let you know we will read this whole
the text messages to you. That's one thing. The interview and the list of things the friend ticks off as to why his friend's story is bullshit. You have to pay attention it is.
I actually couldn't even believe I was reading it as I was thinking to myself, this is his friend who's saying this. But yes, we'll start with the messages that he shared. His name is Daniel Danforth, by the way, and they met twenty twenty three, so they've been friends for a couple of years. They're all voting advocates and love voting, so that's why they have this shared love
and that's how they all became friends. So he says, on Monday, he sees the headlines that Lynette has fallen overboard, so he reaches out to Brian and says, well, there's a little something before that, but we can get to that later. First of all, this is what Brian Hooker responded to him with, Yes, brother, I'm afraid so off the dinghy in some choppy seas. On the way back to the sailboat, the wind blew me away from her and she swam towards the sailboat, and we lost sight
of each other pretty quickly. As it was just about sundown. I drifted and tried to paddle with one oar for the next seven hours until I washed up behind the shore of the next island over and was able to get some help. Finally, we are all still searching. A lot is going on right now, but I thank you for checking in on us. Being on the news is a huge burden, and I just had my first ever news organization call me a few minutes ago. He went on to say, our family is in hell right now.
Search and Rescue just called and said they had searched a bunch of air is today and no joy. They are going back out tomorrow, but a storm is coming in Wednesday.
Okay, So now let's go back up to the first part of that, and you tell me. Robes as he's describing to his friend in private and a text message that he thought would never get public, he's explained it to him what happened. How does that mesh with the story. At least authorities are saying that they were told. Does that match with what he told police about the incident?
No, I don't think so, because, according to police, Brian Hooker told them that she fell into the water and they immediately drifted apart. He didn't say that she was okay when she got in the water and started swimming towards the sailboat. That is a completely new piece of information that if he told that to police, police did not reveal that publicly. So that is a very new and different version of what we've been told.
Okay, the other thing in there had to do what suggestion did he make in there about weather? Because it was hard for people understand she immediately falls out a boat. Why can we just reach out and grab her. How did you all of a sudden get separated? So what's his description in the text, at least about weather?
First he said that it was the choppy seas that kind of threw her overboard, which seems a little suspicious.
I don't know if we had reports of wild weather where you would actually.
Fall out of an eight foot hard bottomed dinghy. But okay, who's a woman who's very skilled in boating and swimming, and she's been doing it her entire life. Then he says, the wind blew me away from her, and she swam towards the sailboat.
Okay, wait towards the sailboat. Yes, a different the.
Other well, that's their yacht.
So they were in the dinghy having just left a place, and they were on their way to the sailboat.
I did not catch this before. Okay, that's different. When you were explaining this, I was reading it. I took it as he was swimming. She was swimming maybe trying to get back towards him and the ding He's saying, she fell out this boat that's closed by, and she tried to go swim to one that's farther away.
Correct. Huh, it makes no sense.
Huh. Okay, I didn't piece that together first time.
Okay, yes, So then the friend, uh this is oh wow.
The friend Daniel Danforth, then asked him if he had anywhere to stay. It was just kind of checking in on him, and Brian wrote this, I got the boat back to marsh Harbor yesterday after the fire department brought me back my dinghy. Notice I he was saying, my not our I'm on a moorning ball at a place called conk in on the boat. My sister and brother in law are flying in later this morning to stay
for a couple of days. I'll probably stay with them for a night or two while weather happens, but then I plan on heading back out to the site and continuing to search. I will most definitely need help in the future, but I just don't know what it is yet. I'm trying to take it one day at a time, keep the faith. Search and rescue is out today before some big winds to come tomorrow. It's interesting because the friend says, Okay, well, I'm going to be getting a sailboat.
We're going to be moving around, but let us know if we can help you, And then he just says, congratulations on your sailboat, captain, and thanks for your kind offers.
I'll be in touch as events unfold.
It just seemed a little Some people pointed out that just seemed a little strange, like, really.
Tom seems off. But really, I don't want to suggest how anybody might feel if you just lost the love of your life in an accident in the water.
Congratulations on the new sailboat, captain.
Who am I to say? But it gets better now you listed at least I think four right things that the friend says that it actually goes through and says this, this, this, and this don't make sense. All right, take it from the top. These are all blew my mind.
Okay, yes, this is why his friend, mister Danforth said he is very suspicious. First of all, he said that he thought of Brian around Sunday. I guess it was on the weekend, so it was after Lynette went missing, but before the headlines really started.
So he just noticed Brian.
He got a Facebook notification on his phone that said Brian Hooker liked a comment that his wife shared about boating. So he said, Brian was actually on my mind because like, oh, Brian's liking a comment my wife put on Facebook on Sunday, and then all of a sudden the headline started popping up, and so dead forthtold CBS News, you know, my wife's missing.
Facebook's the last.
Thing I'm worried about. You're going to find me on the water writing around, not on Facebook. So he thought that was first initially very suspicious, like that's so weird. He was liking my wife's comment while his wife was missing, was about boting. I just don't give something random about how she loves voting.
It's odd even to be on Facebook, but that's one thing to go through and have them Okay, Yes, that is incredibly odd, even if you know you're going to be a suspect.
It's stupid, it really is.
Then he also questioned why Brian moved his boat immediately after Lynette went missing.
He just thought that was a range thing to do.
You're worried about repositioning your boat somewhere, Yes, the larger sailboat.
He just thought that was strange.
Why is that on his mind at all?
Exactly?
Maybe he needed to He was renting a slip for a little while and it was running out.
This is an avid boater who just said, that's not something that makes sense. So that's what he was explaining. With his experience with boats, he just thought that was a strange thing. Then he also said that the messages he received did not jibe with what Brian told police. He said that, yes, Brian told authorities Lynnette was swept overboard, but then he wrote to me that she was swimming back to the sailboat. Those two things don't make sense.
They aren't the same statement. So he pointed that out the differences between what Brian texted him and what police said.
Brian report, Can I ask you to go back up to his statement? Yes, the text message. Yeah, How did he describe her swim? How did he say it?
He said, the wind blew me away from her, and she swam towards the sailboat, and we lost sight of each other pretty quickly, as it was just about sundown.
Go back for me. Second, how does he say in the text messes she ended up in the water.
She fell off the dinghy in some chopping seas. Okay, she fell off in choppy seas.
Swam to the other boat.
It makes no sense.
She fell and instead of getting into the boat she fell out of She swam a distance how far.
Who knows, because he was drifting the winds were pulling him away from her. Here's the other thing I wanted to point out, because the way it was described to at least the way it had been reported, was that it was in the middle of the night.
It was pitch black.
He says it was about sundown, so he could see her.
Why would he not?
And well, this is what the friend gets into, he said. The biggest question for him Why didn't he try to go and get her. If he could paddle the boat with an oar, why would he not paddle towards her?
Why would he paddle towards shore?
Okay, Now I'm not damn. That's a good point too. Even if you don't jump into the water after her, you have the ability to he had a paddle to actually direct the boat that you're in. Okay, Look, I don't I'm not an avid see guy.
Ye Okay.
And then the other the other question he had was where were their phones? He said, every time he has spent any moment with them on the water, on the land, wherever they are, they always have their phones with them, both of them, Because he said, they're always posting videos online.
Their phones are never ever away from them. How is it that these two people were on a boat and neither of them had a phone, because obviously he could have called nine one one, He could have called for help and they could have immediately rescued her.
People don't have phones. I wonder if they know where her phone is, if it's been recovered, she would have taken a phone.
They haven't found her, and I don't know if she had her phone with.
You know, we don't know, but he didn't have his his.
And he's saying that is incredibly suspicious. Why would he not have his phone? It took him seven hours, according to Brian, to paddle back to this island that where he was able to eventually get help, and the reason hours.
But the reason he had to paddle and that didn't make sense either. That the friend, this was a big part of Brian's story robes. He told the authorities, I had to paddle back because I didn't have the key to the boat.
So the friend says, that is a his daughter first of all, or his stepdaughter. Her daughter also said that was strange that she never had the key, and the friend reiterates this and says, okay, the key is usually in the boat with a lanyard on it, like that is where the key stays. No one has the key, no one wears the key. That's not what you do as a boater or a boating enthusiast. You have the
key in the nition with a lanyard. His thought was, he was the only thing I could see happening is that when Lynette was either being pushed off or if there was some sort of an altercation or a fight that in a desperate attempt to try and stay on the boat, or at least to stop him from leaving her, she grabbed the keys as she was going overboard. And when he said that that made so much sense. We don't know but it. But to say that she had the keys on her is a weird thing.
The daughter had said, Brian is the one that always drives, he would always have the key. That made sense, first of all. But robes, you do not have to be a big time avid boater. If you've gone and rented a pontoon boat on Lake Oconee in Georgia, you get that. You don't even touch the key. When they take it is in the ignition and it is turned and stays in that position.
Correct.
Nobody takes a key and puts it in your pocket. Now what would happen? You would drop it in the water. Yes, it just doesn't have You're right. And those things also have little attachments that even if you do drop it, it's still attached to something.
Correct.
Rose, The key part got me. I was like, wow, I did not think about that. Nobody is sitting in a dinghy with the key to the dinghy in your pocket where you could drop it. Nope, nobody does that.
So he pointed that out, and I just thought everything that Brian Hooker's own friend, Daniel Danforth had to say just suddenly made sense because his story hasn't up until now. But do we want to know what's going on with Brian Hooker right now? He is behind bars and his attorney got to meet with him in person for the first time on Thursday. We will tell you what his attorney is telling us about Brian Hooker right now. And welcome back everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ.
We are talking about that mystery in the Caribbean near the Bahamas, where we have a missing fifty five year old Michigan woman, Lynette Hooker. Right now, her body has yet to be found. Authorities have been searching it now for searching for her body for nearly at least searching for her for nearly a week now, and this is certainly a recovery effort at this point. Her husband was arrested. He is behind bars. He's been there since Wednesday and
he has not been formally charged. But his attorney was finally able to meet him. They had an interesting story. His attorneys shared about Brian's arrest.
Didn't make sense either. I mean, was it? And when I said, why even tell that? What was the point? And you said, whoa is Brian?
Yes, poor Brian, and so yes. His attorney is telling the story saying his client almost drowned falling in the water as police were taking him into custody.
That's what he said. He used those words. In fact, I have his exact quote.
He said, Brian had a really traumatic experience being transported here to Grand Bahama. He was taken to his vessel for a search, and when he went there, he was handcuffed and he was told he could have a change of clothes, and he was requested to disembark while handcuffed. When he fell overboard, he had to be rescued by officers. So he's saying he actually needs to get medical attention because he was injured. And he's claiming that he's asking for his client to be looked at because it was
so traumatic. He went on to say, Brian appears completely heartbroken and deeply distressed. His primary concern and source of intense frustration is his inability to continue to search for his wife of twenty five years. The trauma of her disappearance, coupled with his current detention as a suspect, has left him in an extremely fragile state.
So we should have something, know something one way or another today because they are running up against that forty eight hour deadline to see what happens. Look, just because he is in custody, it does not mean he is going to face a charge. It doesn't. And what evidence do they have Romes, besides the circumstantial stuff, What evidence do they have besides what might be on that boat, What else do they have?
It's unclear right now, But what I do think is interesting. His attorney addressed a lot of news outlets are reporting, and this is verifiable that there was a domestic dispute between Brian Hooker and his wife in twenty fifteen, and actually Lynette was the one who is arrested and spent a night in jail. But they said both of the spouses were deeply intoxicated, accusing each other of assault, and there was some visible injuries on Brian Hooker, and so
that's why Lynette was actually taken into custody. But his lawyer, it was interesting, said this, he is the only witness to what transpired, and he has said he has done nothing wrong. So to refer to allegations of abuse or a tumultuous relationship does not explain what happened on the day and indicate whether or not he was somehow culpable for anything that may have happened to her.
I think that is one hundred percent true. That is okay, but it doesn't look good and it will be brought up if there were to be a trial. So this is why stuff like this does become really well with the nature of their relationship. This leads to all kinds of motives and all kinds of things. But just because they could have had the worst, most abusive relationship ever, it doesn't mean he pushed off a boat, and it
doesn't prove he pushed off a boat the man. It sure goes a long way in explaining what is right now an unexplainable accident for a woman who is very knowledgeable in how to behave on the water.
You just said it, and the question will be can authorities somehow have enough evidence to actually charge him with a crime without Lynnette's body, without another witness.
That's tough.
That's a tall, tall, tall mountain to climb, but we will let you know. We'll keep our eye on the story and let you know what the Bahaman officials say later today when it comes to Brian Hooker's detention there in Grand Bahama. But in the meantime, thank you as always for listening to us.
Everyone. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ. Holmes. We'll talk to you soon.