The mysterious fate of Olivia Newton-John’s on-off lover haunted the singer in her later years after he disappeared without a trace – amid lurid claims he faked his own death.
Patrick McDermott, 48, went on a night fishing trip with 22 other people on June 30, 2005, but disappeared before returning to shore unnoticed.
Almost two decades later, he is said to have been hiding in Mexico, fleeing crushing debt.
But repeated manhunts by the police, media and private investigators have never been able to find conclusive evidence despite constant reports of his discovery.
“I don’t think I’ll ever really make peace with that,” Newton-John admitted.
“I think there will always be a question mark.”
The mysterious fate of Olivia Newton-John’s on-off lover Patrick McDermott haunted the singer in her later years after he disappeared without a trace amid claims he faked his own death
She met McDermott after her divorce from first husband Matt Lattanzi in 1995 and began a nine-year on-off romance with the cameraman.
Newton-John was on a promotional tour in Australia when McDermott disappeared and it was another week after the fishing trip before it was noticed that he had left.
The crew of his fishing boat had found the American’s car keys, passport and wallet on board the boat, and his car was found parked at the San Pedro Marina in Los Angeles.
But no one noticed he was missing until he failed to show up at a family event on July 6 and police were finally called on July 11.
By then, however, the trail had gone cold — and investigators found nothing.
McDermott had previously been briefly married and fathered a son, and a court recently ordered him to pay $8,000 in retrospective child support.
Olivia Newton-John (seen here with daughter Chloe Lattanzi) met Patrick McDermott after their 1995 divorce and began a nine-year on-off romance with the cameraman
Patrick McDermott, 48, went on a night fishing trip with 22 others on June 30, 2005, but disappeared before the boat “Freedom” returned to shore unnoticed
He had filed for bankruptcy with more than $30,000 in debt, leading to speculation that he had faked his death in order to escape and start over.
A Coast Guard investigation admitted they “found no evidence of criminal activity, suicide, accident, or hoax in McDermott’s disappearance.”
A three-year investigation into the fishing boat “Freedom” found it did not take a people count on the day of the trip, resulting in McDermott’s disappearance going unnoticed.
Both probes concluded that McDermott probably went missing during the night at sea.
However, eyewitnesses continued to report seeing him in Mexico, where he was said to be living on a yacht off the coast of Sayulita and Acapulco.
TV companies have repeatedly sent teams of undercover film crews and private investigators to hunt him down, and set up sophisticated online website traps to track him down.
Nearly two decades later, he is said to have been hiding in Mexico, fleeing crushing debt, and living on a yacht off the Mexican coast at Sayulita
Eyewitnesses reported seeing Patrick McDermott throughout Mexico, including near Acapulco
One investigator, John Nazarian, stressed in 2016: “It is rumored that he was dating a German national. I spoke to people there.
“The girl he was traveling with was described with a German accent.
“To come to the conclusion that he fell off the boat and allegedly no one saw him fall off the boat is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”
However, all manhunts proved fruitless and McDermott remained elusive.
Photos of a man and woman believed to be McDermott and his new lover in Mexico were published by New Idea magazine in 2017.
But the claims were reversed weeks later when a Canadian couple came forward and said they were the people in the photo.
Olivia Newton-John left tragedy behind to move on with life, met future husband John Easterling and married him at an Inca ritual in Peru in 2008
Olivia Newton-John left tragedy behind to move on with life, met future husband John Easterling and married him at an Inca ritual in Peru in 2008.
But the mystery continued to haunt her in the years that followed, though she had come to terms with the fact that McDermott was most likely dead.
“He was lost at sea and nobody really knows what happened,” Newton-John told 60 Minutes in 2016.
“It’s human to wonder. Because whenever you’re going through tough times, there’s always those concerns.
“Those are the things in life that you have to accept and let go of. Of course there are always questions and that is human.
‘But you know, I live on.’
WHAT HAPPENED TO OLIVIA NEWTON-JOHN’S LOST LOVER?
For nearly two decades, theories have swirled about the fate of Olivia Newton-John’s on-off lover, cinematographer Patrick McDermott, 48.
He disappeared on June 30, 2005 while on a 22-hour overnight fishing trip aboard the boat Freedom from the San Pedro Marina in Los Angeles.
The boat crew found his car keys, wallet and passport on board after all other passengers disembarked the next day, and his car was found parked nearby.
The crew hadn’t kept a staff count so no one noticed he was missing for another week when he failed to show up for a family event, with police being alerted nearly a week later.
Since then, speculation has raged as to what happened to him, and investigators have been unable to find any evidence of a crime, suicide, hoax or accident on the fishing trip.
Officials believe he simply fell overboard and drowned, but conspiracy theorists insist he may have had another boat offshore to pick him up.
Others believe he may have placed his belongings on the boat before it slipped off, possibly before it even left port without realizing it.
Private investigators set up a website FindPatrickMcDermott.com to try to trick the missing American into giving himself away and identifying the location of everyone who accessed the site.
Olivia Newton-John stayed in touch with McDermott’s ex-wife Yvette Nipar (pictured) about the fate of the missing American film cameraman
A surge of internet traffic from the Sayulita region of Mexico’s west coast sparked an unsuccessful hunt for him there.
Others say they saw him on a yacht off the coast of Acapulco, 1000 km to the south.
An investigator claimed to have found him and spoken to him in 2009, claiming he just wanted to be left alone, but the claim was unfounded.
Another claimed to have categorical evidence he was alive and was close to revealing it – but never did.
Over the years he has been sighted in Mexico and Central America at least 20 times, but many have been proven wrong.
A series of pictures of a couple said to be the distinctive-looking McDermott – who was half-Korean and adopted at the age of two – turned out to be a Canadian couple.
His ex-wife Yvette Nipar, the mother of their son Chance, asked for the speculation to end for her child’s sake.
She asked Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to block the publication of a book by private investigator Philip Klein about her ex’s disappearance.
“My son has been through enough emotional agony because of this,” Nipar wrote, branding Klein a “serial liar.”
‘He’s not ready to go on yet because Mr Klein is constantly trying to keep him in the public eye.
‘Let him rest in peace.’