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Disappearance of Amy Lynn Bradley
Unsolved 1998 disappearance of 23-year-old American woman From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Amy Lynn Bradley (born May 12, 1974) is an American woman who went missing during a Caribbean cruise on the Royal Caribbean International cruise ship Rhapsody of the Seas in late March 1998 while en route to Curaçao. Her whereabouts remain unknown. A graduate of Longwood University, she was age 23 at the time of her disappearance.
On March 24, 1998, the ship's door lock system recorded Bradley returning to her family cabin at 3:40 a.m., after staying up dancing until late. Her father Ron awoke around 5:30 a.m., to see her sleeping on a deck chair; however, she was missing at 6:00 a.m.. When authorities were alerted, the Netherlands Antilles Coast Guard conducted a four-day search in the surrounding waters and along the cruise lines to no avail. Authorities began to speculate that she may have fallen overboard and drowned or died by suicide.
In the years since her disappearance, there have been several claimed sightings of Bradley in Curaçao, Barbados, and San Francisco. While investigators have been unable to corroborate any of these sightings, they have fueled speculation that Bradley fell victim to foul play or human trafficking. The case has been presented on Dr. Phil and America's Most Wanted. In July 2025, the three-part documentary series Amy Bradley Is Missing was released on Netflix.
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Background
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Early life and education
Amy Lynn Bradley was born on May 12, 1974, in Petersburg, Virginia, to Iva and Ronald "Ron" Bradley, an insurance executive.[1][2][3] She has a younger brother, Brad.[4][5] Bradley was a resident of Chesterfield County, Virginia.[5] She graduated from L. C. Bird High School[6] and attended Longwood University with a full scholarship in basketball,[7][8] graduating with a degree in sports psychology in December 1996.[1][9] Bradley was known for her strong swimming abilities as well as having previously worked as a lifeguard.[10][11] Bradley came out as gay to her family while in college; her ex-girlfriend stated that when Bradley told her parents about her sexuality they "were not happy" and were "disappointed".[12] Her father stated: "It's Amy's life, it wasn't what we would choose for her, but it's her life and we loved her unconditionally."[12]
Prior to the disappearance
Ron won an all-expenses-paid family cruise from his employer;[13] and Bradley joined her family on the Royal Caribbean International cruise ship Rhapsody of the Seas en route for Curaçao, a Dutch Caribbean island under the Kingdom of the Netherlands.[14] Bradley was afraid of heights and was initially apprehensive about the cruise, due to the size of the ship and being out on the open ocean, but was excited for the trip as Brad had returned home from college and would be joining the family.[15] Bradley had a full-time job at Ruth's Chris Steak House, but had reduced her hours and was planning to start a new job at a computer consulting firm on her return from the cruise.[1][16]
On March 21, 1998, Bradley and her family boarded the ship.[17][11][16] On March 23, Bradley and her brother Brad stayed up late dancing and drinking alcohol with the ship's band, Blue Orchid, at a disco party on the ninth-floor deck.[16][18][4] One of the band's members, Alister "Yellow" Douglas, was seen drinking and dancing with Bradley that night but claimed that he left the party at around 1:00 a.m.[18] Videographer Chris Fenwick captured Bradley and Douglas dancing.[18][19]
After a couple of hours, Brad returned to his family's cabin on the eighth-deck.[2] The ship's computerized door lock system recorded that Brad returned to the cabin at 3:35 a.m.; Amy Bradley followed five minutes later.[20][21] Brad reported that he and his sister sat on the suite's balcony and talked before he went to sleep. Amy is believed to have stayed awake a while longer.[16][22][23]
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Disappearance
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Between 5:15 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. on March 24, Ron awoke and checked on his children, seeing that Bradley was asleep on the lounge chair of their cabin's balcony. Ron told local newspapers: "I could see Amy's legs from her hips down. [...] I dozed back off to sleep. The balcony door was closed, because if it hadn't been closed, I would have gotten up and closed it."[24][25] However, other reports indicated that the balcony door was open at the time.[2] When he got up at 6:00 a.m., however, Bradley was gone, along with her cigarettes and lighter. He later said, "I left to try and go up and find her. When I couldn't find her, I didn't really know what to think, because it was very much unlike Amy to leave and not tell us where she was going."[26] After Ron searched the common areas of the ship, he woke up the rest of the family and told them at 6:30 a.m. that Amy was missing.[16][18][23][24][25]
On the morning of the disappearance, three witnesses claimed to have seen Bradley on the upper deck with Alister Douglas between 5:30 a.m. and 5:45 a.m., in possession of a camera. They also testified to seeing Douglas hand Bradley a drink containing dark liquid. They claimed Bradley and Douglas arrived in the elevator at the same time, and that Douglas was then seen leaving the upper deck alone shortly after 6:00 a.m.[25][4]
Search and investigation
Bradley's family immediately reported her disappearance to the onboard crew and pleaded with the crew members to keep the 2,000 passengers from disembarking the cruise and to make an announcement to assist in finding Bradley.[15][4] However, the team at the purser's office informed them that it was too early to make a ship-wide announcement.[13] The crew agreed to issue an announcement at 7:50 a.m., after a majority of the passengers had left the ship, announcing "Will Amy Bradley please come to the purser's desk?"[13] Between 12:15 p.m. and 1:00 p.m., the cruise staff searched through the ship but could not find Bradley.[13] The delay in launching an immediate search has been called a mistake that could have hurt chances of finding Bradley.[19]
Brad recalled that Douglas came up to him shortly after Bradley disappeared and said, "Hey man, I'm sorry to hear about your sister."[13] No announcement had been made by that time and Brad said the timing of the conversation was "suspicious".[27] The FBI interviewed Douglas soon after and gave him a polygraph test, which he passed.[13] Ron said that Douglas "came out of the interview smiling, with his thumbs up to his band members, like [...] everything's cool. [...] I knew what was going on. I knew he had been with Amy."[27] Douglas denied knowing anything about Bradley's disappearance.[27]
The Dutch Caribbean Coast Guard conducted a four-day search that ended on March 27. Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines chartered a boat to continue looking for her.[2] The Coast Guard used three helicopters and a radar plane to assist in the search.[3]
Initially, the authorities suspected that Bradley had either fallen overboard or died by suicide.[24] However, investigators said that there is "no evidence that Amy, a trained lifeguard, fell overboard, was pushed or committed suicide."[3]
Possible sightings
One month after Bradley's disappearance, her family traveled to Curaçao and were approached by a cab driver who claimed to have seen Bradley while the ship was docking on March 24.[15] He said Bradley was running through the parking lot in search of a phone.[4] He stated he remembered her green eyes which were described in the reward poster.[15] The witness also claimed to have seen Bradley in other locations on the island. The cab driver's claims were never corroborated by authorities.[25]
In August 1998, two Canadian divers claimed to have seen a woman they believed to be Bradley on a popular Curaçao diving beach known as Playa Porto Marie.[4] Witness David Carmichael claimed that a woman matching Bradley's description was in the presence of two "aggressive men", one reportedly fitting Douglas's description.[4][27] The witness yelled out to a friend, asking if he had a piece of his dive gear. The woman believed to be Bradley, upon hearing the man speak English, reportedly spun around and came back towards him.[15] The witness then claimed that the man resembling Douglas came into his field of vision and motioned the woman away to the beach's bar. Carmichael claims the woman would occasionally look at him and then look down,[4] appearing to try to subtly communicate with him. The witnesses were 2 feet (0.61 m) away from the woman and accurately described Bradley's eyes and tattoos.[4][15] Carmichael recognized Bradley after seeing her photo on America's Most Wanted and stated: "I am haunted by that encounter with Amy. I know it was her."[3] He later phoned Bradley's father and flew to Virginia to meet the Bradley family.[4][3] The FBI investigated the reported sighting but were unable to corroborate the claims.[27]
U.S. Navy Petty Officer William Hefner claimed to have encountered a woman claiming to be Amy Bradley at a brothel in Curacao in January 1999.[4] Hefner described being seated in the bar area when a Caucasian woman approached him, identifying herself as Amy Bradley and pleading for assistance. According to Hefner, she told him she was being held against her will. Hefner said the woman explained her situation, telling him that she had been on a cruise, had disembarked to seek drugs, and was now trapped in the establishment.[28] After retiring from the Navy, Hefner reached out to Bradley's family in May 2002, explaining that he initially refrained from reporting the incident due to concerns for his military career related to his presence in a brothel. He expressed conviction that the woman he encountered was indeed Amy Bradley. The FBI subsequently investigated these claims; however, they discovered that the brothel had burned down and no substantive evidence was found to support Hefner’s assertions.[4][27][29]
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Later developments
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In the fall of 1999, Bradley's parents received an email from a man named Frank Jones.[30][4] Frank told the family that he was a former U.S. Army Special Forces officer with a team of experienced soldiers who might be able to rescue Bradley.[30] Jones had claimed that his team had seen Bradley being held by heavily armed Colombian personnel in a housing complex surrounded by barbed wire. The team also gave an accurate description of Bradley's tattoos and sang the lullaby that Bradley's mother used to sing to her.[25] Over the next few months, Frank would feed news to the family and provided reports on sightings of their daughter. When Jones told them they were going to attempt a rescue, he added that more funds were needed. The Bradleys sent Jones a total of $210,000 to fund the set up for the search and had expected a call from Jones and his team for the results of the rescue mission that never came. Jones had made the story up and had tried to scam the Bradleys of money. In February 2002, federal prosecutors in Richmond charged him with defrauding the Bradleys of $24,444 and the National Missing Children's Organization of $186,416. Jones pleaded guilty in April of mail fraud and was sentenced to 5 years in prison.[30]
In April 2003, witnesses reported seeing a woman matching Bradley's description in San Francisco, California, watching a street musician in the company of two men. The witnesses asserted they immediately recognized the woman as Bradley. Upon realizing they had been identified, the two men reportedly seized her and fled the scene. The woman allegedly cast a "pleading" look to the witnesses as she was being taken away. FBI sketches were released of the men who were believed to be with Bradley at the time.[31][32]
In March 2005, a witness named Judy Maurer claimed to have seen Bradley in a department store restroom in Bridgetown, Barbados. Maurer said she was using the restroom when a woman entered accompanied by four men who were discussing what sounded like an illegal "deal." Maurer said the woman at one point asked the men if they could "stop and see the children." It is unknown what children were being referenced.[33] Maurer claims at that point the men left the restroom and she exited the stall and spoke to the woman. She said she believed the woman said she was from West Virginia, and softly said her name was Amy. Maurer called authorities and they created composite sketches of men and the woman based on her account.[17][15]
Bradley's parents appeared on the November 17, 2005, episode of Dr. Phil. During that episode, an image of a scantily clad woman resembling Bradley that had been emailed to her parents was shown on the program, suggesting that she could have been trafficked into sexual slavery.[34] Two photographs were discovered online by a member of an organization that attempts to track victims on sites that feature sex workers. The woman in the photo has been said to appear "distraught and despondent" and was a sex worker known as Jas.[35][36] The authenticity of the photographs could not be determined by the FBI; special agent Erin Sheridan stated: "We did follow that lead. The difficult part is back then information such as that or pictures such as that, you cannot tell when they're altered."[27] A man who later worked with the FBI performed facial comparisons and his opinion was that the photographs were of Bradley.[27]
In 2010 a human jawbone washed ashore in Aruba.[17][37] Initially, it was thought to be the jawbone of another missing person, Natalee Holloway, but testing determined that it did not belong to her.[35] No DNA or other testing was done that could have established a connection to Bradley, although the remains were said to be likely from a Caucasian woman.[17][35]
Bradley was declared legally dead on March 24, 2010, twelve years after the disappearance with no witnesses and no body found.[38]
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Theories and speculation
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There are several theories in regard to the disappearance of Bradley, including one that she was kidnapped and sold into the illegal human trafficking industry in the Caribbean,[25] based on the account of Hefner and the photo that was emailed to Bradley's family in 2005.
This theory also includes suspicions of the ship's band members on the night of Bradley's disappearance and conflicts between the story that bass player Douglas gave to authorities compared to what was seen on CCTV footage.[18][25] Claims have also been made that a waiter on the ship could have been involved in Bradley's disappearance. Throughout the night, Bradley's family was approached by the waiter asking to pass on a note to Bradley for him involving an invitation for her to go drinking with him once they reached shore.[25] In addition, the professional photographer had printed out all photos taken throughout the cruise to sell at a stall, but the family could not find any of Bradley's photos; this made the family believe that the photos had been removed by somebody.[25]
Another theory authorities considered was that Bradley was murdered on the ship and thrown overboard. However, the only evidence supporting this is the discovery of a jawbone which washed ashore on a beach in Aruba.[17] The final theory includes Bradley falling overboard or committing suicide as initially suggested by the authorities.[11][16]
In November 1998, FBI special agent James Weber stated: "We've pursued every angle, from whether there was foul play, a suicide or an accident, and we have basically not gotten anywhere."[21]
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Aftermath and rewards
The FBI is currently offering a reward of up to $25,000 for any information that could potentially lead to finding Bradley or leading to the arrest and conviction of person(s) responsible for her disappearance.[39][40] The family has offered a $250,000 reward for information leading to her safe return and a reward of $50,000 for information leading to her current location.[17][30]
Bradley's case was featured on Unsolved Mysteries, America's Most Wanted[40] and the television show Disappeared.[41] Her case was also the subject of episode 59 of the Casefile podcast and the podcasts Crime Junkie[42] and The Casual Criminalist.[43]
Renewed attention was paid to her case after the disappearance of Natalee Holloway in 2005.[34][44][45][46]
On July 16, 2025, a three-part documentary series titled Amy Bradley Is Missing was released on Netflix.[47]
In July 2025, Podcast host, Ethan Klein, announced on the H3 Podcast that he would offer a $1,000,000 reward for any information or actions leading to Amy Lynn Bradley being safely returned home.[48]
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See also
- Disappearance of George Smith – Unsolved 2005 disappearance
- Disappearance of Natalee Holloway – Unsolved 2005 disappearance of American woman in Aruba
- Disappearance of Rebecca Coriam – 2011 disappearance from cruise ship
- Disappearance of Sarm Heslop – 2021 disappearance in the U.S. Virgin Islands
- List of people who disappeared mysteriously at sea
References
External links
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