FILE PHOTO: Rescue personnel operate in search for the missing, including British entrepreneur Mike Lynch, in the area where a luxury yacht sank off the coast of Porticello, near the Sicilian city of Palermo, Italy, August 21, 2024. REUTERS/Guglielmo Mangiapane/File Photo
PALERMO, Italy (Reuters) -Italian prosecutors are investigating two more crew members from British tech tycoon Mike Lynch's yacht, along with its captain, in connection with the vessel's sinking over a week ago, a judicial source said on Wednesday.
Being investigated does not imply guilt and does not mean formal charges will follow.
Lynch and six other people were killed when the British-flagged Bayesian, a 56-metre-long (184-foot) yacht, capsized and went down on Aug. 19 within minutes of being hit by a pre-dawn storm while anchored off northern Sicily.
On Monday, the boat's 51-year-old captain James Cutfield, a New Zealander, was put under investigation for manslaughter and shipwreck. Cutfield declined to respond to prosecutors during questioning on Tuesday.
Ship engineer Tim Parker Eaton and sailor Matthew Griffith are being investigated over the same crimes, the source said, adding that Parker Eaton is suspected of having failed to protect the yacht's engine room and operating systems.
Griffith was on watch duty on the night of the incident, the source said. He flew out of Palermo late on Wednesday, with the source saying he was heading for the French city of Nice.
Those under investigation have no obligation to stay in Italy but have to nominate lawyers so that the authorities have a way of remaining in contact with them.
Four other crew members, who have not been placed under investigation, left Palermo, with two of them heading for Dubai and the other two travelling to Istanbul.
The sinking has puzzled naval marine experts, who said a vessel like the Bayesian, built by Italian high-end yacht manufacturer Perini, should have withstood the storm and, in any case, should not have sunk as quickly as it did.
Prosecutors in the town of Termini Imerese, near Palermo, have said their investigation would take time, and would require the wreck to be salvaged from the sea. The Bayesian is lying on its right side, at a depth of around 50 metres (164 feet).
(Reporting by Wladimiro Pantaleone, writing by Cristina Carlevaro, editing by Alvise Armellini, Bernadette Baum and Diane Craft)
