The skipper at the helm of a speed
boat involved in a crash on Thursday on the Amalfi Coast in
which American publisher Adrienne Vaughan was killed is under
investigation for culpable homicide and culpable shipwreck,
Salerno Prosecutor Giuseppe Borrelli told a news conference on
Saturday.
The 45-year-old woman, the president of Bloomsbury USA, which is
part of the group that, among other things, publishes the Harry
Potter books, died after being thrown into the water and
reportedly hit by the boat's propellers.
The speed boat collided with a 45-metre sailing ship, the
Tortuga, which around 80 foreign visitors were on board
celebrating a wedding.
Vaughan was on the chartered speed boat with her husband, who
suffered limb injuries in the accident and is in hospital, and
her two children.
The prosecutor said that one of the children ended up in the sea
too.
The skipper was positive in a toxicology test taken after the
crash.
But Borrelli stressed that "no matter what the result of the
tests were, it is necessary to verify whether there is a causal
link to the collision".
Borrelli said prosecutors had spoken to over 70 eye witnesses,
including Vaughan's husband.
The 30-year-old skipper suffered fractured ribs and injured his
pelvis in the accident, sources said.
He is in a different hospital to the husband.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA
