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Love boat on troubled waters: cruise lines promise fun and romance and encourage partying aboard ship. When negligence or crime results in injury to passengers, what remedies does the law provide?

Article Excerpt
In 2004, the North American cruise industry carried an estimated 10.8 million passengers on cruises worldwide, 8.1 million of them embarking through U.S. ports. (1) Cruises are popular vacation options, but when passengers are injured or killed on cruise ships, the legal options for recovering damages are hampered by evidentiary hurdles, procedural obstacles, and maritime laws that don't apply to cases that arise on U.S. turf.

Florida is the capital of the cruise industry: Carnival Corp. and Royal Caribbean Cruises, combined, control more than three-fourths of the North American cruise industry and, like Norwegian Cruise Line, are alien corporations headquartered in South Florida. (2) Almost all major cruise ships sailing from U.S. ports are registered under foreign flags, so they are not bound by U.S. health, safety, or wage laws. (3)

There are no police officers or judges aboard cruise ships, unless they are traveling on vacation. There is no governmental presence, and therefore no applicable shipboard criminal statutes. The flag nation's criminal statutes apply only while the ship is in that country's territorial waters. Building codes, lawful drinking age, legal limits for alcohol consumption, and legal age for sexual consent--as those concepts are understood ashore--do not apply on a cruise.

The annual number of injuries and deaths during cruises can only be expected to grow as the volume of passengers increases. (4) Typical incidents include passengers falling aboard ship after being served alcohol, disappearing from ships and not being found, being sexually assaulted by crew members, being improperly diagnosed or treated by the ship's medical personnel (or, if the sick passenger is put ashore, by personnel there), and being injured while on shore excursions. (5)

What remedies do these passengers have? If you're handling a cruise ship case, you need to know what obstacles you are likely to encounter and how to overcome them.

The Love Boat mystique

A familiarity with some key elements of the cruise industry can help you pursue justice for your client.

Sex and the floating city. Many passengers vacation on cruise ships with the hope of finding romance and intimacy aboard. These expectations, along with alcohol consumption and the general party atmosphere, contribute to a sexually charged environment that affects both passengers and crew. Numerous sexual assaults of passengers by crew members during cruises have been well documented. (6)

Some forms of crew misconduct may derive from their employers' business models and hiring practices. Crew members live and work in confined quarters, are away from home for extended periods, and work long hours with little downtime, even during port calls. The crew's alienation from normal home and family activities leaves many vulnerable to social entanglements with passengers.

Most crew members are men, who may come from areas of the world where the cultural views of male-female interaction and sexual harassment differ from those of North Americans. Some crew members may be culturally inclined toward aggressive sexual behavior or have a low regard for the status of women. Many--if not most--crew members alleged to have committed sexual offenses against passengers aboard cruise ships have been cabin stewards, bartenders, dinner waiters, or others whose jobs involve daily passenger contact. (7)

To deter such misbehavior, a cruise line must do more than write up a "zero tolerance" policy and pay lip-service to it. Criminals aboard cruise ships, like those elsewhere, commit crimes because they perceive a minimal risk of detection and prosecution. Some cruise lines fail to install sufficient surveillance cameras in public areas to identify and deter potential perpetrators. Other carriers fail to hire enough supervisors and security guards to adequately keep tabs on the rest of the crew. Some carriers fail to make it clear to crew members that zero tolerance also applies to crew-passenger contact ashore. Carriers also generally do not warn passengers to be wary of crew member misconduct.

Booze ahoy. If sex sells in the cruise business, alcohol really sells. Since all tickets are prepaid, a cruise's profitability depends on how much money is spent on board. Alcoholic beverages typically are not included in the passenger's ticket price, and they may be the largest source of onboard revenue. Cruise ships are designed to enhance alcohol sales--they have serving stations in every nook and cranny. Customer charge accounts may automatically be billed an additional "gratuity" of up to 15 percent of each drink's price, which creates a financial incentive for servers...