Death on high seas still a mystery as husband awaits sentencing
South Florida couple Lewis Bennett and Isabella Hellmann had been married for a few months when they embarked on a sailboat adventure in the Caribbean for their belated honeymoon.
Only one of them returned home.
Hellmann disappeared in the early hours of May 15, 2017, from the couple’s 37-foot catamaran, Surf Into Summer, as they sailed near the Bahamas on their way to Florida.
For 18 months Bennett denied any responsibility for his wife’s disappearance at sea, but then, in November, he pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter. He was initially charged with second-degree murder, accused of staging an unconvincing accident to cover up Hellmann’s death. But federal prosecutors, who soon became aware of the strife in the couple’s marriage, struggled with proving his alleged crime and reached a plea deal with Bennett.
At his sentencing hearing Tuesday, Bennett still did not hint at what might have led to his wife’s disappearance and death. “Losing my soul mate is the greatest loss I have ever endured,” Bennett, 41, said, apologizing to his wife’s family, who are from Colombia and attended the hearing.
Bennett, who is being held at the Federal Detention Center in Miami, faces the maximum sentence for his offense, eight years, as recommended by prosecutor Kurt Lukenheimer. But his defense attorney, Raymond D’Arsey Houlihan, argued for seven years.
However, U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno delayed Bennett’s sentencing in the end because of lingering unresolved issues over the deceased wife’s estate and restitution for the couple’s two-year-old daughter, Emelia, who is living in Scotland with Bennett’s parents.
The sentencing was rescheduled for May 28, allowing enough time for a lawyer representing the wife’s family to sell her Delray home, valued at $160,000. There is also another $22,000 in a trust. The proceeds would go towards the cost of raising the couple’s daughter.
Much of Tuesday’s hearing was overshadowed by the bitter differences between Bennett’s family and his late wife’s family over visitation rights with the couple’s only child. Isabella Hellmann’s family members expressed tearful objections to the plea agreement because they believe Bennett killed his wife on the high seas.
“What happened that night with my girl?” Hellman’s mother, Amparo Alvarez de Rodriguez, said in Spanish to the judge.
“He needs to say what happened,” said Hellmann’s sister, Dayana Rodriguez in English. “She disappeared and that’s it. What happened to her? And we’re here suffering.”
Bennett, a mining engineer with dual citizenship from his native Britain and from Australia, explained in his plea deal that his wife’s death was an accident that he did not witness, but he admitted it was foreseeable and caused by his negligence.
Hellmann, 41, who was a real estate broker with U.S. citizenship, disappeared overnight on May 15, 2017, as the couple sailed near the Bahamas towards Florida. They were on a postponed honeymoon trip that included stops in the British and Spanish Virgin Islands, Saint Maarten, Puerto Rico and Cuba.
Bennett told investigators at the time that the boat experienced difficulties while he was sleeping below deck and Hellmann was on watch. He said she was missing when he came above deck after a loud noise woke him up.
At his plea hearing in November, Bennett admitted he did not require his wife — a weak swimmer and inexperienced sailor — to wear a life vest or harnesses tethered to their catamaran, all of which were on the vessel. Bennett, who is a strong swimmer and has extensive training and experience in sailing, also acknowledged he did almost nothing to try to find his wife.
“Mr. Bennett could not recall whether he called out her name. Although Mr. Bennett threw a horseshoe life ring overboard, he did not deploy flares to illuminate the area to look for his wife or to signal his position, nor did he turn the catamaran around to look for her,” according to his statement in the plea agreement. “Additionally, Mr. Bennett did not search for her with the catamaran or the dinghy that was attached.”
But he did spend maybe 45 minutes loading up a life raft with food, water, safety devices, a satellite phone — and about $40,000 worth of stolen silver and gold coins.
“He never came back and told us what happened,” said Hellman’s sister, Dayana Rodriguez. “He was asleep. She doesn’t know anything about boats. He does.”
This story was originally published January 29, 2019 at 1:07 PM.
