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High-Seas Mystery Haunts Miami

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By TODD LEWAN, The Associated Press

Published: October 15, 2007

MIAMI - Unlike most boats returning from the high seas, the sport fisher Joe Cool had no tales to tell.

Three days earlier, the boat had departed for the island of Bimini, four crew members and two passengers aboard. A day earlier, it had been found, doing circles and dragging anchor, on a stretch of the Florida Straits about 30 miles north of Cuba.

With no crew.

And no passengers.

As a Coast Guard cutter towed it back into Biscayne Bay, a hush fell over its home, the Miami Beach Marina.

Along the docks and the palm-lined pier, 'Everyone stood there and followed the boat with their eyes,' Valerie Kevorkian, a dive shop operator and scuba instructor, recalled, 'and then there was only emptiness ... a ghostly feeling.'

Indeed, the Joe Cool had returned with only clues to a high-seas mystery full of twists, discrepancies, revelations and contradictions.

Investigators would pluck from the vessel some valuable evidence: four 9 mm shell casings; a tiny key that might or might not unlock handcuffs; splotches of human blood, inside and outside the cabin.

They would also find, drifting in an orange life raft 12 miles north of the ghost ship, two seemingly incongruous men who had chartered the Joe Cool - a 35-year-old suspected thief on the run from police in Arkansas, and a clean-cut, 19-year-old Cuban-American training to become a private security guard.

They would interrogate these survivors, take down a story that three pirates had hijacked the boat and coldly shot each crew member, and then, for some reason, let these two go in a life raft with their luggage and about $2,200 in cash.

Investigators didn't buy the story. On Wednesday, prosecutors charged the suspects with first-degree murder in the killing of the Joe Cool's young, four-member crew: the captain, Jake Branam, 27; his wife, Kelley, 30; Jake's half-brother, Scott Gamble, 35, and their friend and first mate, Samuel Kairy, 27.

For a week after its return, the Joe Cool sat in dock at a Coast Guard station across the channel from the marina. No one was allowed near the vessel - except the forensics experts who combed it for clues.

'This could have happened to any one of us, and whenever you looked at that boat over there, it reminded of you of that,' said Greg Love, 51, who runs Club Nautico South Beach, one of the marina's charter businesses.

Mystery Starts In Arkansas

As with many sea mysteries, this one starts on land - in central Arkansas, to be precise.

It features a fellow named Kirby Logan Archer, who, by the age of 35, had been described as a loner, a romantic, a sensitive son, a vindictive husband, a loving father, a gay man.

According to a 'wanted' flier from the Independence County sheriff's office, Archer stands 6 feet tall and weighs 190 pounds. His mug shot reveals a no-nonsense squint and a grown-out crew cut - a throwback, maybe, to his Army days. (He had been a Military Police investigator at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, during the Cuban Rafter Crisis, which began in 1994. He went AWOL four years ago, receiving an 'other-than-honorable' discharge, court records show.)

Arkansas prosecutors have accused Archer of robbing the Wal-Mart in Batesville, where he worked as a customer service manager.

On a Friday night this January, they allege, Archer stashed $92,620.66 in cash and checks in a microwave oven and re-sealed the box. A surveillance video showed that Archer strolled out the front doors with the box at 10:25 p.m., after paying for the microwave at the front checkout counter.

By the time a court had issued a warrant for his arrest the next morning, Archer had fled the state.

He left behind a wife, two children and a troubled home life. Though his current wife, Michelle, has described him as a 'wonderful father,' his previous wife, Michelle Rowe, says Archer was quite the opposite.

At the time Archer went on the lam, he was the subject of a child molestation investigation, though no charges have been filed, said Sgt. David Huffmaster of the Sharp County, Ark., sheriff's office. (In 1993, while living in Tucson, Ariz., Archer was found guilty of a misdemeanor charge of contributing to the delinquency or dependency of a minor.)

Allan Kaiser, a lawyer appointed to defend Archer in Miami, said the allegations come mainly 'from an ex-wife who is pretty unbalanced.'

Miami Appearance

For nearly eight months, Archer lay low. When he surfaced, he was in the Miami area, spending time with a 19-year-old Cuban immigrant: Guillermo Zarabozo.

To his neighbors in Hialeah, Zarabozo was sociable, respectful, well-behaved. He lived with his mother, sister, stepfather and pet dog.

Gaby Lopez, 19, a Hialeah High School classmate, knew him as 'an easygoing' student who excelled in science and math and was in the school's Junior ROTC.

Until recently, Zarabozo worked for private investigation and security companies and held a state permit to carry three types of handguns.

But if Zarabozo got along so well with his neighbors, why did he install a video surveillance camera in the hall outside of his family's apartment? And if, as Zarabozo's neighbors and friends attest, Archer never visited Zarabozo at home, school, or work, how and when did they meet?

Kaiser, Archer's attorney, said the two were introduced in Florida six months ago by 'people they knew mutually.'

Zarabozo's mother, Francisca Alonso, said in a TV interview that her son's father had been stationed at Guantanamo in 1995, when Archer was an MP officer there. (Archer briefly mentioned 'a boy from Cuba whose family he apparently befriended while stationed in Cuba,' according to his ex-wife, Rowe.)

Zarabozo came to the United States in 1999, after winning a visa lottery in Cuba, his mother said.

Archer and Zarabozo shared a number of traits: Both spoke fluent Spanish and had lived in Cuba; both were fastidious, very attentive to their physiques, and well-trained in the use of handguns.

And, on a breezy Saturday, both boarded the Joe Cool.

Taking Off In The Joe Cool
The travelers initially approached the charter boat's first mate, Sammy Kairy.

They wanted a ride to Bimini. They'd met a couple of lovely young ladies and were supposed to rendezvous with them in the Bahamas. It would be a one-way trip.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary about the two men, according to people at the marina that day and the next. The pair seemed polite. One spoke in a slow, Southern drawl. He was willing to pay cash.

It was still the slow season for chartering. The snowbirds and the corporate types wouldn't start flocking to Florida to fish the Gulf Stream for another month or two. A charter a week was good money that time of year.
Kairy gave them the business number of the boat's owner.

The next afternoon, Sept. 21, Archer and Zarabozo turned up at slip D-30, where the Joe Cool was docked. They had six black bags. The vessel's owner, Jeff Branam, a stout man with sun-bleached gray hair, helped carry their luggage aboard.

Archer told him they worked for a survey company, had finished early, and were off to the Big Game Resort and Yacht Club on Bimini. Branam said a boat trip would set them back $4,000. The crew, after all, would have to sail back to Miami.

With little more than a nod, Archer pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket, peeled off 40 $100 notes, and held them out.

Branam asked why they didn't just take a plane. A one-way ticket would cost $150, tops.

Haven't got my passport, Archer told him. Girlfriend packed it in her luggage and went on ahead. She's going to meet us at the dock.

Branam took the money.

There was no reason to feel funny about it. Another outfit in the marina charged $3,500 to $4,900 for a full day fishing on yachts about the size of the Joe Cool. Miami Beach was a rich man's playground.

About 4:30 p.m., under sunny skies, the Joe Cool sailed into the light chop of Biscayne Bay, on its first-ever charter to the Bahamas.

The captain, Jake Branam, with a $1,000 share and plans to fish for yellowfin tuna on the return, couldn't have been happier. His wife, Kelley, didn't usually tag along; she had a 3-year-old daughter, Taylor, and an infant son, Morgan, to look after.

But this time, she was able to leave the kids with Jake's grandfather. Besides, it was the weekend and this was only a one-way job.

Criminal Case File

What happened next, according to criminal complaints filed in federal court against Archer and Zarabozo, is this:

The Joe Cool was expected to return the next day at noon to prepare for a Monday charter. By 4 p.m. that Sunday, with no word from his nephew, Jeff Branam contacted the Coast Guard. Within two hours, the sport fisher was spotted, drifting.

But it was 160 miles south of Bimini, on the Cay Sal Banks, just a short sail from Cuba.

Coast Guard officers boarded the vessel, finding it 'in disarray.' Investigators discovered six marijuana cigarettes, a cell phone, luggage, cameras, a laptop, Zarabozo's Florida ID card, a small key, four spent shell casings - and blood, in the stern and cabin.

They noted the boat's navigational equipment and electronics had been left untouched, along with some expensive fishing gear. But they found no life raft, no guns, no bullets or slugs.

And no bodies.

The boat's Global Positioning System indicated the Joe Cool had started off heading due east toward Bimini. Then, halfway to its destination, it had veered 190 degrees south. Why the drastic change in course, which pointed straight toward Cuba?

Two cutters, a C-130 plane, a P-3 Orion patrol plane and helicopters swept the Gulf Stream, searching more than 10,000 square miles. On foot, searchers checked out dozens of small, uninhabited cays.

Still they found no crew.

They did, however, spot a life raft, drifting northward with the Gulf Stream current. In it were Archer and Zarabozo, with a supply of water, their luggage, and some other curious objects: a blow gun, darts, several knives, and 22 $100 bills.

What were they doing out there?

During the trip back, Zarabozo told investigators that pirates had hijacked the Joe Cool. They shot the captain dead, he recounted, and then killed his wife the same way 'because she was hysterical.' The hijackers then ordered the remaining crew to throw the bodies overboard, shooting them, too, when they refused, he said.

When the pirates told him to dump the bodies, Zarabozo said he complied and, at gunpoint, cleaned the boat. Then, he claimed, the invaders commandeered the vessel and sailed it south until it ran out of fuel. Ultimately, a third boat picked up the hijackers, who spared him and Archer the crew's fate.

Something's Not Right

The survivors' version of what happened appeared highly suspicious to prosecutors.

They say:

•No radio transmissions or maydays about a hijacking came from the boat. There was a 'distress' button on the VHF radio, which, when pressed, would send the Coast Guard the sport fisher's position.

•Four spent shell casings had stamps matching ammunition purchased by Zarabozo in February.

•There were no scratches or marks on the Joe Cool's hull, typically left by a boarding vessel.

•Though Archer and Zarabozo say they were going to rendezvous with girlfriends on Bimini, no women have come forward.

•Although the survivors told investigators the killings occurred on the boat's exterior deck, human blood and three of the four shell casings were found inside, in the main cabin.

•Cuba, just beyond where the men were picked up, has no extradition treaty with the United States; that fact led Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Tsai to say in court that Archer and Zarabozo were attempting 'a one-way trip out of the country.'

Still, without a murder weapon, a confession, bodies, bullets - or any witnesses beyond the accused - proving that Archer and Zarabozo plotted and committed first-degree murder won't be easy, veteran defense lawyers say.

'That's a fairly thin case,' says James Cohen, a criminal law professor at Fordham University. Proceeding without bodies can be done but 'it's much more difficult,' he said.

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