{"id":307984,"date":"2025-11-23T00:19:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/307984\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T00:19:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:19:11","slug":"stepbrother-investigated-in-death-of-florida-high-schooler-on-cruise-ship-florida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/307984\/","title":{"rendered":"Stepbrother investigated in death of Florida high schooler on cruise ship | Florida"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 16-year-old stepbrother of a Florida<\/a> teenager found dead aboard a Carnival cruise ship this month has been identified as a suspect in her death.<\/p>\n

Anna Kepner, an 18-year-old from Titusville, was found dead under a bed on the Carnival Horizon on 8 November, wrapped in a blanket and covered by life vests, ABC News<\/a> reported. Preliminary findings indicate she died of asphyxiation from a bar hold \u2013 an arm across the neck \u2013 with investigators noting two bruises on the side of her neck. A final autopsy and toxicology report are still pending.<\/p>\n

The high school cheerleader had reportedly been sharing a stateroom<\/a> with her stepbrother during the family trip, which included her father, stepmother and two step-siblings. The boy was allegedly allowed to drink while the ship was in international waters, according to an attorney involved in a separate custody dispute<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He was taken to the hospital after the ship docked in Miami.<\/p>\n

Neither the FBI<\/a> nor Carnival has said publicly how Kepner died, whether a crime occurred or what led agents to focus on the teen.<\/p>\n

Carnival Cruise Line is cooperating with the Miami office of the FBI on an investigation of the death of a guest on the Carnival Horizon ship, a statement to CBS News Miami said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur focus is on supporting the family of our guest and cooperating with the FBI,\u201d Carnival Cruise Line said.<\/p>\n

The disclosures about the teen\u2019s possible involvement surfaced during a family court hearing involving his parents, Shauntel Hudson and her ex-husband, Thomas Hudson, according to News 6 WKMG<\/a>. Both parents acknowledged in court filings that their middle child, identified only as \u201cTH\u201d, is under FBI investigation in connection with Kepner\u2019s death.<\/p>\n

Shauntel Hudson has since asked the court to delay a custody hearing. The parents also agreed to have the boy temporarily live with a relative.<\/p>\n

The case has drawn further attention after Kepner\u2019s biological mother, Heather Wright, said she learned of her daughter\u2019s death only through Google searches.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI ended up Googling it, because the only information I had was that my daughter was on a cruise,\u201d Wright said, according to CNN<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Kepner, who was expected to graduate high school next year, was memorialized Thursday at a church in Titusville, where the hundreds of mourners who attended were encouraged to wear bright colors \u201cin honor of Anna\u2019s bright and beautiful soul\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 16-year-old stepbrother of a Florida teenager found dead aboard a Carnival cruise ship this month has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-307984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}