Weeks before Lynette Hooker disappeared during a nighttime boat ride in the Bahamas, she was telling a friend she could not be out there with her husband and did not plan to go back. In messages sent in January and February 2024, Hooker said, “I guess it was too much closeness. We decided to call it quits. I'm not going back,” and added, “It was real bad. I can't be out there with him.”
The messages, sent while Hooker was staying with her mother in Florida, show a marriage that had already begun to fracture before the couple’s trip ended in alarm. Hooker told Marnee Stevenson, “We were married 21 years. Our marriage lasted 6 weeks cruising,” and said she had “quit my awesome career, sold my house and gave away everything I own to cruise.” Stevenson replied on social media, “Looks like things are on the up and up,” and Hooker answered with heart emojis and a thumbs up.
By late February 2024, the messages indicate the couple had reconciled. That matters now because the pair was sailing in the Bahamas earlier this month when Hooker disappeared. Brian Hooker reported his wife missing on Sunday, April 5, saying she had been swept away from a dingy that lost power the night before. He said the power loss hampered his ability to seek help.
Brian Hooker was detained and questioned by police after the disappearance and later released. Attorney Terrel Butler, who represents him in a criminal investigation by the Bahamian Royal Police Force, said he denies any wrongdoing, is heartbroken by the incident and wanted to be released from custody so he could search for his wife. The newly surfaced messages do not answer what happened on the water, but they do show that the marriage at the center of the case had already been through a break and a repair before the night that Hooker went missing.
