Apologies in advance for the lengthy post. I am admittedly relatively new to this case and have not yet watched the documentary, but I went through the newspaper archives to see what officials said about the case back then. Most of the media coverage relied on the information relayed by Amy's family, but I did manage to find a few official statements.
In the last thread, a few commenters stated that the FBI would not be involved in the case if there was no evidence of foul play. Shortly after Amy's disappearance, FBI spokeswoman Sara Lema told the media that FBI has jurisdiction because the ship operates from U.S. territory (
Roanoke Times, 28 March 1998). IANAL but this seems to be in line with
18 U.S. Code § 7 which states that "special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States" applies to "any vessel belonging in whole or in part to the United States or any citizen thereof, or to any corporation created by or under the laws of the United States, or of any State, Territory, District, or possession thereof." IIRC Royal Caribbean Ltd is based in Miami, FL -- thus "special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States" would seemingly apply to Rhapsody of the Seas because Royal Caribbean is a "corporation created by or under the laws of the United States."
Initially, FBI spokeswoman Sara Lema told reporters that the agency had no evidence of foul play in Amy's disappearance (
Free Lance-Star, 27 March 1998). Later statements by other FBI officials did not rule out any possibilities and seemingly pointed to a lack of evidence pointing towards foul play, accident, suicide, etc. ––
- J. Perry Smith, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI's San Juan Division said in April 1998 that "the investigation is very thorough, and we're not done yet. We have an unexplained disappearance, which may be a crime on the high seas ... And we will investigate until we're satisfied as to what happened." (Times-Dispatch, 2 April 1998)
- James K. Weber, special agent in charge of the FBI office in San Juan, said that "we've pursued every angle, from whether there was foul play, a suicide or an accident, and we have basically not gotten anywhere." (New York Times, 16 November 1998)
Very few official statements provide any insight into the investigation into Amy's disappearance. FBI spokeswoman Sara Lema said FBI agents interviewed crew and passengers at the cruise's next stop in St. Maarten (
Roanoke Times, 28 March 1998). Lema also said that agents with trained dogs searched the ship for two days but found no trace of Amy (
Miami Herald, 31 March 1998).
A 1999
Style Weekly article which covered Amy's disappearance discussed competing claims about the presence of Amy's footprints on the table on the balcony (
Style Weekly, 27 April 1999). According to the article, Royal Caribbean spokesman Rich Steck said that the FBI told Royal Caribbean that the agency found Amy's footprints on top of the deck table. The Bradleys claimed the opposite –– that the FBI told them that Amy's footprints were
not found on the table. The author of the
Style Weekly article said that when asked about this discrepancy, the FBI said they would not have disclosed any information about the investigation to Royal Caribbean but the FBI also would not confirm that Amy's footprints were
not found on the table on the balcony.
A 2001 article in
People stated that "the FBI found marks on the ship’s balcony railing consistent with someone having sat on it" although the statement is not attributed to a specific FBI spokesperson (
People Magazine, 13 July 2001).
Based on these statements, I believe Amy likely went overboard. The FBI may or may not have evidence of an accident, depending on whether Amy's footprints were found on the balcony table (with respect to this, I find it interesting that the FBI refused to confirm that Amy's footprints were
not found on the table).
On the other hand, beyond the circumstantial evidence raised by the family, the FBI has not pointed to any concrete evidence of foul play. In fact, the FBI initially stated there was no evidence of foul play (
Free Lance-Star, 27 March 1998) and did not find any trace of Amy despite 2 days of searching the ship with trained dogs (
Miami Herald, 31 March 1998). MOO but if Amy was abducted and taken off the ship as the family claims, surely the dogs would have picked up some trace of her during that two day search. On the other hand, if she went overboard, the lack of a scent would make complete sense as in that case she would have never left the cabin that night.
I truly feel for Amy's family -- I can't imagine spending decades living in limbo not knowing what happened to their daughter -- but IMO the abduction theory is not backed up by any concrete evidence. Even based solely on the FBI statements listed above, and not taking into account other circumstantial evidence such as Amy's drinking or her family's apparent disapproval (MOO) of her being lesbian, I think it is far more likely she went overboard (MOO but I believe she likely fell over the railing accidentally).
