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US Coast Guard Finds and Boards Yacht in High-Profile Missing Person Case

Soulmate
Soulmate, as seen from a U.S. Coast Guard search aircraft (USCG)

Published May 14, 2026 11:18 PM by The Maritime Executive

The U.S. Coast Guard received a challenging and unusual assignment last weekend: to seize, secure and search a sailboat off Florida in connection with a high profile missing-person case. 

Last month, married couple Brian and Lynette Hooker were on a trip through the Bahamas aboard their sail cruising yacht, Soulmate. On the night of April 4, Lynette Hooker disappeared; Mr. Hooker arrived on shore and reported her absence in the early hours of April 5. No indications of Lynette Hooker's whereabouts have been detected since, and Bahamian authorities released Mr. Hooker after questioning. Amidst considerable media attention, the Coast Guard Investigative Service is leading its own parallel probe under U.S. jurisdiction. 

The yacht Soulmate left Marsh Harbor in the Bahamas on Friday and got under way for U.S. shores. The Coast Guard Investigative Service intercepted the sailing vessel in international waters, about 40 nautical miles off the coast of Melbourne, Florida. 

The USCG described the boarding as a "complex surveillance and interdiction operation" with multiple participating surface and airborne assets. After Coast Guard officers went aboard the vessel, its engine lost power, and it had to be taken in tow by a Fast Response Cutter, the USCGC Winslow Griesser. The yacht was taken into the harbor at Coast Guard Station Fort Pierce, Florida, arriving Monday. The seizure was first reported by local media and later confirmed by CGIS.

Mr. Hooker was not aboard at the time of the interdiction: he previously returned to the U.S. to attend to the needs of his mother, who is in ill health, his attorney told CBS.

CGIS is soliciting information from any potential witnesses who would like to step forward, and has been conducting interviews.

Mr. Hooker - who has not been charged with any crime - maintains that he did nothing wrong, and says that his wife went overboard in a tragic accident. "I am heartbroken over the recent boat accident in unpredictable seas and high winds that caused my beloved Lynette to fall from our small dinghy near Elbow Cay in the Bahamas," he wrote in a Facebook post after her disappearance. "Despite desperate attempts to reach her, the winds and currents drove us further apart."