ROME — Italian prosecutors said Saturday they have opened an investigation into a culpable shipwreck and multiple homicides after a superyacht capsized in a storm off the coast of Sicily, killing seven people on board, including British tech mogul Mike Lynch and his daughter.
Termini Imerese prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio confirmed that the investigation had been opened, but said no suspects had yet been identified.
“We are only at the initial stage of the investigation. We cannot rule out any developments at this point,” he told reporters at a news conference.
Cartosio said his team would carefully examine every possible element of liability, including that of the ship’s captain, crew, those in charge of supervision, the ship’s builder and others.
“For me it is likely that crimes have been committed, that it could be a case of involuntary manslaughter, but we can only establish that if you give us time to investigate,” he said.
The main question investigators are looking into is how a sailboat deemed “unsinkable” by its builder, the Italian shipyard Perini Navi, was able to sink while a neighboring sailboat remained largely unscathed.
Prosecutors said the event was “extremely rapid” and that information they obtained appeared to indicate a “downburst,” a powerful, localized wind that descends from a thunderstorm and spreads quickly as it hits the ground.
Civil defence officials initially said they believed the yacht, which has a distinctive 75-metre (246-foot) aluminium mast, had been struck by an over-water tornado known as a waterspout.
Investigators were also questioned about why the crew was almost entirely rescued, except for the chief, while six passengers remained trapped in the hull.
A local official confirmed that most of the bodies recovered were found in the same part of the ship, near the exit, suggesting that the passengers had tried to get out.
Deputy prosecutor Raffaele Cammarano said it was likely the passengers were asleep, adding that one of the main aims of the investigation was to determine whether they had been alerted by someone.
Cammarano confirmed that there was a person on duty in the cockpit.
Rescuers brought ashore Friday the last of seven bodies from the wreck of the Bayesian, a 56-metre British-flagged luxury yacht that sank in a storm near the southern Italian Mediterranean island early Monday. The yacht was carrying a crew of 10 and 12 passengers.
The seventh victim is Hannah Lynch, 18, daughter of Mike Lynch, whose body was found Thursday. He was celebrating his recent acquittal on fraud charges with his family and the people who had defended him during his trial in the United States. His wife, Angela Bacares, was among the 15 survivors.
Rescuers struggled for four days to recover all the bodies, slowly working their way inside the wreck lying on the seabed 50 metres (164 feet) below the surface.
The other five victims are Christopher Morvillo, one of Lynch’s American lawyers, and his wife, Neda; Jonathan Bloomer, chairman of Morgan Stanley’s London investment banking arm, and his wife, Judy; and Recaldo Thomas, the yacht’s chef.
