Cruise Bruise Blog
October 26, 2009
October 26, 2009
Cruise Industry Lies And Child Molestations Have History In Industry Executives
There are times when I am doing research, I have to just get up from my desk, walk away and think about something else. That is particularly true when it comes to researching sexual assaults, especially those involving children. It is a painful topic, hard to research and even more difficult to tell. It takes time, far too much time.
Over the past month I have had nine cruise industry sexual assault cases, where the alleged or convicted attacker was arrested, on my desk requiring extensive research. Dozens of hours have been spent working into the wee hours of the morning pouring over court testimony that was far too graphic and vastly disturbing. The filth shakes me the core.
Still, as long as the cruise industry and the pro-industry sites continue to say these things don't happen, that women and children are liars, these convictions must become public knowledge.
I have discovered, only yesterday, that biggest liar in the cruise industry when it comes to sexual assaults was Carnival Cruise Line CEO Bob Dickinson. The line has been accused in the past of lying about the numbers of sexual assault on their cruise ships.
When pressed by the media and congress, the line has held that the discrepancies in the numbers are not cover-up and lies, merely different ways of attributing the incidents. It is hard to make that case when in a February 03, 2000 article published by the Miami New Times, Bob Dickinson is quoted as saying he is "proud no employee has been successfully prosecuted for rape."
This statement was made, 11 years after Julian Bustamante, a Carnival Cruise Line janitor was convicted of raping a child aboard a Carnival ship. Bustamante is still in prison to this day.
The Miami New Times articles goes on to quote Dickinson, "We don't want to give even the slightest appearance that we're covering things up or not interested in full disclosure and justice in each of these cases...".
Dickinson further states, "There was not one criminal investigation or one criminal trial that resulted in a guilty verdict in any of these allegations." It is so good to know that the line doesn't want to give even the slightest appearance that they are covering sexual assaults up. The case of Julian Bustamante proves otherwise.
Working through the cases, I finished researching the two-case set of Garland George Curtis and James Dickson Bell II yesterday. Falling into one case, I discovered the second and the hours seem just disappear as I went through court testimony, appeals, victim's statements and police affidavits.
Garland George Curtis, a waiter aboard Dolphin IV was convicted on October 28, 2002 by a jury for aggravated sexual abuse and given a sentence of 17.5 years and a fine of $3,347.02. He too is still in prison today.
Curtis raped a teen aboard The Cape Canaveral Cruise Line's (Dolphin Cruise Lines) Dolphin IV, based in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The 718-passenger Dolphin IV departed from Port Canaveral for two and four-day trips to the Bahamas and Key West.
What ties this story to the other is the fact that the director of the cruise line was James Dickson Bell II. Bell would become the single worst known child molester in cruise industry history with victims ages ranging from three to fifteen years of age, scattered from Ohio to Florida over a period of 30 years.
While Bell's employee sat in jail awaiting trial for sexually assaulting a 19-year-old passenger, Bell was in a Florida motel room having sex with a little girl who was only 7-years-old. Both men were convicted of their crimes.
It is hard to imagine the cruise industry being serious about sex crimes, when the worst crimes of all are committed by a cruise industry executive.
Given that Bell originally had rented an apartment in Akron, Ohio where the children were sexually assault and over 1500 pornographic photographs were made of the acts, instead of assaulting them in his 18-room mansion where his wife and two little girls lived, it was no surprise to discover he was using motels in Florida as well.
The biggest motel of all though could have been the cruise ships he was involved with. The ships, sailing to Caribbean nations full of exactly the kind of poor, vulnerable children Bell sought out, were just floating cousins to the apartment and the motel rooms. While police chose to focus on the children in the photographs, another potential area of the problem was never examined.
I don't blame investigators. The sheer number of Bell's victims made the case so massive, it had to strain the police department's budget and human resources. Had they had an unlimited budget and hundreds to work the case, there is no telling how many victims they would have found.
It does my heart good to know that in the end, Bell suffered physically for his crimes, as the photograph on his case page would indicate.
Telling the story today on Cruise Bruise is extremely important. As more people discover Cruise Bruise and browse the photographs of not only the sex offenders on this site, but on the Cruise Ship Sex Offenders site as well, it is hoped more people will come forward after recognizing faces.
It will be the public awareness of the high volume of victims in the end that bring about the kind of regulations families need in order to really feel safe from crime on cruise ships.
The research into the other cases on my desk goes on. But, one final word, keep your children close . . . very close. Money bought the souls of the women who served small children to the devil. Prestige means nothing, when it comes trusting people around those you love the most. It only serves as a cover for the worst possible crimes on humanity.
