Every Town - UNSOLVED: The Disappearance of Disney Cruise Ship Employee Rebecca Coriam

Episode Date: February 24, 2023

The place where dreams are made takes a dark turn when a young crew member was reported missing. She was Rebecca Coriam who worked on the Disney Wonder which was one of Disney’s many cruise ships. But in the spring of 2011, Rebecca was never seen again. To this day, Her disappearance remains under investigation even though the family has already settled a lawsuit with Disney back in 2016.💥 Watch On Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/scarymysteries🎧 Our Other Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1235579💀 Follow Our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scarymysteries 💀 Follow Our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/andrew.fitzg👁 Follow Our TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@andrewfitzgerald💥 Follow Our Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/scarymysteriesofficial🗣 Business Inquiries: [e-mail] Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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But in the spring of 2011, Rebecca was never seen again. I'm Mandervic Gerald, and in this episode of Every Town, we'll be talking about how Rebecca disappeared at sea just over a decade ago. To this day, her disappearance remained. under investigation, even though the family has already settled a lawsuit with Disney back in 2016. Getting to know Rebecca, she was born in Chester, England on March 11, 1987. She had a sister and two foster brothers, and she was known to have a close relationship with both her parents, Anne and Mike. She also attended Catholic school and enlisted in the British Army cadets during her teenage years. And for her university degree, she studied sports science at

Plymouth University. She was said to have a very active social life and like doing outdoor activities. She taught sports as she took classes and youth studies at her university, and even traveled to the United States to work at a youth camp in Maine. So fast forward then to 2010 when Rebecca was interviewed for a position with Disney cruise lines. It's no surprise that Disney has a sizable young fan base, given the abundance of kid-friendly activities available on the ship. The kids focused entertainment options included video games, music, movies, karaoke, parties, and social gatherings.

So in short, the ship needed enthusiastic and outgoing crew members to work and play with all the children on board in order to make this possible. Rebecca was the best candidate for the position given how active she was when it came to participating in youth activities. So she excitedly got a job and will later go on to become the youth activities counselor. where she was on board the ship to amuse and care for children and teenagers. After being hired by the company, she was sent to Florida for training, and she spent four months working on a ship sailing to the Bahamas. Then on March 21st, she went back to work on the Disney Wonder after taking a two-month break to visit her family back in England.

And that's when the cruise ship set sail from Los Angeles, California, bound for Porto Vallette to Mexico. But then, shortly after the voyage began on March 26, second 2011 at 5.45 a.m. Rebecca was last seen on surveillance footage, acting visibly upset while talking on an internal phone line in the crew lounge. Her clothes appeared to be both not her own and were much too large for her. On the CCTV footage, a man approached her and appeared to ask if she was okay. She was seen in the video telling the man that she was just fine. And then, after she hung up the phone, she was never heard or seen from again.

When Rebecca didn't show up for a 9 a.m. shift, Disney employees were notified to search the ship for her, but they just couldn't find her anywhere. Even the Mexican Navy and the U.S. Coast Guard were contacted to search the ocean, but they, too, weren't able to find any signs of her. The alarm was fully raised a few hours later when she failed to show up for work, as according to Disney, they claim she was swept overboard by an unusual wave and disappeared into the sea. The passengers that were on the ship that day were aware of the missing employee. This was according to a story that appeared right after Rebecca's disappearance was reported. In an interview, a passenger said, They told us over the loudspeaker several times that they were looking for her, and then all of a sudden they said they still hadn't found her.

Another passenger explained, We didn't notice anybody panicking or frantically going in and out of rooms. I didn't even notice a search. They said that they were searching, but there was nothing obvious. Rebecca's father, Mike, claimed that Disney ignored standard operating procedures. It did not circle the ship in search of his daughter. He also claims that the Navy and Coast Guard teams were given the wrong coordinates, which perhaps led them to search the wrong area of the ocean.

The crews continued. When it finally docked again, Mike and Am were taken to the fifth deck of the ship, they learned of the incident, but they only had a brief time to access it. There's a sort of memorial to Rebecca, a crew member had placed flowers on that deck, but still nobody knew what happened to her, and her parents refused to accept a half-hearted Disney statement that claimed they believe she simply fell overboard. But most people seem to have accepted the convenient explanation

that she must have been washed overboard by an unusual wave and just continued on with their lives. So then, was this a tragic accident, or, as it possible, there's something much more sinister at hand? After all, a wave large enough to knock someone off a cruise ship from high up certainly must have been seen or felt by other people. Mike Corium said, People go on ships and are lulled into a false sense of security because they're happy places for holiday makers. Crimes are swept under the carpet, and incidents are not investigated properly. Records from the morning of the incident indicated that the weather was calm, so it seemed unlikely that a wave could crash in the ship.

The lack of cameras on the deck was another suspicious part of the story. Of course, there are additional cameras installed all over the ship, just like the one that recorded her talking on the phone that morning, but none of them were investigated further. There were claims that she must have fallen over because a pair of flip-flops were discovered on the deck, But when her parents were gathering her belongings, they brought those flip-flops to her room, and they saw that Rebecca's name and cabin number weren't written on those flip-flops. They were also the wrong size, and they knew they wouldn't have fit her. So they weren't hers. So this further confirmed Mike and Anne's hypothesis that something else, maybe something more sinister, was at work.

They felt that they were given very little information and that no one was really trying to figure out what happened to Rebecca. From her parents' point of view, nobody was actually interested in learning what had happened to their daughter that morning. They got the impression that Disney wanted them to stop looking and just accept the fact that she was dead. In addition to all this, it was discovered that Rebecca's Facebook password

had been altered, and her bank account had been active after she vanished. All this painted a rather ominous picture, but even though there were fresh hints, friendly Disney stuck to their account the wave incident. And despite the absence of any solid proof, the official investigation was then concluded. However, things didn't stop just there. In October of 2011, journalist John Ronson went aboard the Disney Wonder to conduct his own investigation of the case for a piece he was writing.

Many crew members quietly revealed to him that they knew more about her fate than Disney or the Bahamian police had publicly acknowledged. And some even revealed that they weren't allowed to discuss it with anybody. Disney's explanation for what might have happened is that after receiving the distressing phone call that morning, Rebecca then went outside on deck number five to collect her thoughts. There then, she either chose to go overboard or a rough wave carried her over. Additionally, John looked into several potential locations where Rebecca might have allegedly fallen, jumped, or been washed overboard. Ronson observed that deck number five was surrounded by very high walls. It would seem unlikely for a wave to flow over and take somebody out. You just

couldn't see how this could have even been possible. Maybe Rebecca slipped because she was leaning against the wall, or perhaps there was a sinister factor at work. It's actually interesting that Disney claimed there was no footage of her because security cameras are prominently placed all over the place. Making it appear impossible that there would not be footage of her from after her visit to the lounge. Ronson left with a strong impression that Disney knew more than they were letting on and became convinced that they actually had these tapes and were hiding them. However, everyone he talked to seemed to be persuaded that she had somehow gone overboard either by accident or because of suicide. In 2016, five years after being declared missing, Rebecca's girlfriend at the time the incident

finally opened up about Rebecca's final night on that Disney wonder. Her name was Tracy Mell. Her Her name was Tracy Medley. And in an interview with the British tabloid the son, Tracy discussed what she thought happened to her friend. She asserted that Rebecca was in fact quite distressed and that she had been using cocaine at the time of her disappearance. Both of them were employed by Disney Wonder's youth clubs when they first met in 2010. A darker side of Rebecca that had never been discussed in public was now being revealed.

Rebecca had been using cocaine even while she was back in England. and Tracy recalled one night when Rebecca had become infuriated with her, and she stated the following to the sun. She started drinking, and while we tried to walk her back to her room, she'd scream, cry, punch herself in the face, and bang her head against the walls of the ship. According to this account, it took four people to calm her down, and they all carried her to Tracy's room.

Later that evening, Tracy woke Rebecca up, and she told Tracy she felt like a failure for not having the car. courage to jump off the ship. Rebecca reportedly believed that the inability to commit suicide was a sign of weakness. Tracy told her that that was absurd, and the fact that she didn't jump demonstrated that she had goals in life, which is why she couldn't carry it out. From what it seems, Tracy tried her best to console her. Rebecca allegedly had drinks at the bar the night before she vanished, along with Tracy and her boyfriend Devin. They would go on to have a threesome later on that evening, which Rebecca had suggested herself.

Rebecca's spontaneous behavior excited Tracy. She claimed that she thought Rebecca was finally unwinding and letting her hair out. They returned to Devin's room after leaving the bar and did it there. Together they all fell asleep, and that is, until Rebecca woke up at some point. Tracy was too exhausted and intoxicated to accompany her, so she stayed with Devin. Rebecca put on some of Devin's clothes after saying that she needed to go for a walk, and that she needed something to wear. Tracy agreed and left the door unlocked after Rebecca left

so she could enter the room after her walk by herself. Tracy realized Rebecca had never returned to the room when she woke up, and that's when she went into a panic because she sensed something wasn't right. And these statements made by Tracy seemed to line up with the CCTV images taking on the morning that Rebecca vanished. Tracy says people have an incorrect perception of her, so she was finally coming forward to clear her name. The day Rebecca vanished, she never left her room,

and she stayed in the room despite the fact that everyone knew something bad had happened. She claimed that she had nothing to hide and that, I never did anything to physically harm Rebecca. My gut tells me she jumped, only because there were previous attempts. Rebecca's family made no comments after Tracy came forward. Her dad expressed concern in a 2017 Hollywood Roald. record her article, though. This wasn't because he found out Rebecca was a lesbian, but because her father thought she was coerced into having a threesome and having sex with Devin. They believe Rebecca was

sexually assaulted that night, which is why she was so upset during the phone call the next morning. It seems possible for Rebecca to react strongly after the fact if she had her very first threesome and was already emotionally sensitive. Because of her feelings for Tracy, she might have regretted her actions, been angry that she did it, or been sad about the experience altogether. These emotions might have been why she had tense actions captured on that security footage, but does that mean that she took her own life? Well, that part is still unclear. There's a lot of unanswered questions and competing theories about what might have

actually happened. Sadly, though, neither the investigation nor its absence has led to any answers. It's confusing enough that only one. officer was assigned to a missing person's investigation that involved a location where thousands of people lived nearby. The Corioms were never given a copy of the case's final report, and very little evidence was given to them, and no information about the investigation was disclosed. One of Rebecca's closest friends and the last passengers on the ship to speak with her while

she was still alive also came forward and gave his opinion to BBC saying, I was never spoken to by any security or police at all. To call this an investigation is an insult. Desperate to find their daughter, Mike and Anne have established a website titled Help Us Find Rebecca and launch campaigns in an effort to raise money and awareness in support of their mission to unravel the mystery of what actually happened. Her case has not yet been solved, leaving her parents in the dark. In reality, we may never fully grasp Rebecca's fate

Only shards of the puzzle here and there, the remaining pieces are out at sea. Is it possible she was accidentally killed by a huge wave? Did Disney try to cover up something, perhaps a murder that they knew all about that didn't want bad press about? Or did she actually commit suicide? Her parents don't want to accept the suicide thought. They even discovered free tickets to Disneyland Paris while retrieving her belongings from her cabin. She had messaged her mother about it, so they were aware that the tickets were intended

as a gift for them. Additionally, there was a note that read, call mom on her bedside table. These clues convinced Rebecca's parents that she didn't commit suicide. Nothing about her seemed to suggest that she was considering it. Instead, she appeared to be making plans for the future. There are still a lot of missing pieces, like what actually happened during the phone call where she seemed in distress. Who exactly did she speak? Who exactly did she speak? speak to and was there any connection at all between it and everything else? And why did the investigation go so horribly wrong? Despite the fact that there are cameras everywhere, why hasn't any additional CCTV footage been

made public? What does Disney actually know? It certainly seems unlikely that any of us will ever know for sure, especially given the fact that Disney has remained incredibly evasive and uncooperative on the subject. Rebecca Coriam's family has been denied. the closure they've so longed for, our body has never been found. It appears that this case will never be completely solved. Friends and family are still looking for answers to the same nagging questions more than 10 years later. And although the case has gone cold, closure is all that they see.

So that's going to do it, guys, for this week's Everytown. I hope you enjoyed the episode. We come out with new ones every single Friday, so come on back and check us out for some more. If you want additional content from us, you can check out our Scary Mysteries YouTube channel or our Scary Mysteries podcast. You can also follow me on social media. All those links are down in the description below. Hope you guys have a nice day. Stay safe out there.