CCTV footage shows last moments of groom who ‘vanished’ on cruise during honeymoon
Topics: Crime, True Crime, Sex and Relationships, Wedding, Cruise, Cruise Ship
Rhianna Benson
Featured Image Credit: Royal Caribbean/Facebook
Topics: Crime, True Crime, Sex and Relationships, Wedding, Cruise, Cruise Ship
What was supposed to be the happiest holiday of newly-married couple George Smith and Jennifer Hagel's life, soon turned sour when, during their honeymoon cruise, the groom seemingly disappeared into thin air.
Now, two decades later, George's family still have no idea what harrowing fate befell him that night after blood was found in numerous locations around the cabin, but a body was never found.
And now, after 19 years, the CCTV footage of what many believe to be his final moments alive is continuing to circle on social media - as do the theories regarding what exactly happened to him?
Was it a tragic fall into the crashing waves below that killed George? Or did someone else onboard have some more sinister intentions in mind?
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Or - even more chilling - is the theory that George may alive somewhere...
In the early hours of 5 July 2005, George and his new wife Jennifer - who'd tied the knot 11 days prior in plush ceremony in Newport, Rhode Island - were enjoying a booze-fuelled evening on board Royal Caribbean's Brilliance of the Seas ship.
On board the ship, George became friends with another passenger, Josh Askin, 20, as well as others.
On the evening of 4 July, Jennifer and George went to the ship’s casino which turned into a drunken night. CCTV from the casino is the last time George was seen alive.
Josh Askin, along with three other men on the ship - Rusty Kofman, Greg Rozenberg and Zach Rozenberg - were said to have helped George back to his cabin after he was too drunk.
They then told the police that they helped him take his shoes off before putting him to bed and then heading their separate ways and ordering room service, although the cruise ship has no records of this.
A legal representative for Askin later argued, however, that a simple oversight in the hand-written hospitality records may have meant that the orders weren't written down.
Wife Jennifer was later found around 4.30am after passing out in one of the ships' hallways, but she has little recollection of what happened after the casino.
With George last seen alive in the casino, it was later assumed he must have fallen overboard, with bloodstains being found on the side of the ship.
Yet one piece of evidence didn't appear to support that theory.
Bloodstains were also found on his bedsheets, which remain unexplained.
In the cabin, a chair was found pushed up against the railings of the balcony leading to the assumption that George had climbed up and then gone overboard from the ship.
Yet the bloodied sheets remain with no explanation, and police none the wiser even 19 years later.