14 DAY TRIAL // The other day, an alleged extortion plot concerning a photo of John Travolta’s late son, Jett, as he was laying half-dead in the ambulance was revealed. Legal representatives for the actor confirmed the attempt, saying the Bahamian police was doing its best to uncover who might have been behind the blackmail. A few hours ago, three suspects in the case were arrested, one of whom is a close friend of the Travoltas and prominent politician, former Minister of Tourism Obie Wilchcombe, TMZ reports.
The first two suspects were apprehended earlier, the one aiding the police in establishing their identities being Wilchcombe himself. They are Pleasant Bridgewater, an active political figure in Bahamas and current member of Parliament, and Tarino Lightbourne, the driver of the ambulance that rushed Jett to the hospital. It seems that Lightbourne snapped a photo that was the object of the blackmail on his cell phone and then, aided by Bridgewater and Wilchcombe, tried to blackmail Travolta into buying it, threatening to sell it to the highest bidder if the actor did not comply.
Ironically enough, TMZ reports, it was Wilchcombe who led the police to the two, being taken to the police station to aid authorities. It was later revealed that he too was somehow “implicated” in the attempt, which is why he is being currently detained. Sen. Bridgewater was charged with “abetment to extort and conspiracy to extort,” and then released on $40,000 bail, TMZ informs us. The charges brought against Lightbourne have not yet been made public though several media outlets are reporting that he might still be in police custody.
The extortion plot was made public, as noted above, a couple of days ago, when Ossi and Butler, the two attorneys that have legally represented John Travolta since he was young, traveled to the Bahamas to meet with two men who claimed to have a damaging piece of information on the actor, and for which they were asking to be paid a yet unspecified amount of money. Since then, the first lead of the investigation was that one of the paramedics who tried to revive Jett might have been involved.
Jett, Travolta’s 16-year-old son, passed away on January 2 because of what the autopsy established to be a “seizure.” The teen had a long history of seizures – despite John’s desperate efforts to help him until the ambulance arrived, as well as those of the paramedics, Jett was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital.