Prosecutors are investigating the captain of superyacht that sank off Sicily

ROME (AP) — Prosecutors in Italy are investigating the captain of a superyacht that sank during a storm off Sicily last week, killing seven people, on possible charges including manslaughter, his lawyer said Monday.

James Cutfield, the 51-year-old New Zealand national who was captain of the Bayesian, was among 15 survivors of the Aug. 19 sinking that killed British tech magnate Mike Lynch, his daughter Hannah and five others.

Cutfield is being investigated for possible manslaughter and culpable shipwreck, said lawyer Aldo Mordiglia, one of two attorneys appointed for the captain's defense.

Mordiglia said Cutfield, who already has been questioned, would be questioned again by prosecutors on Tuesday. He declined to discuss the strategy for the defense.

Under Italian laws, being under investigation doesn’t imply any guilt, and doesn’t necessarily lead to criminal charges.

On Saturday, chief prosecutor Ambrogio Cartosio confirmed that an investigation had been launched. He said his team would consider each possible element of responsibility including those of the captain, the crew, individuals in charge of supervision and the yacht’s manufacturer.

The 56-meter (184-foot) British-flagged luxury yacht went down near the Mediterranean island in southern Italy. Investigators are focusing on how a sailing vessel deemed “unsinkable” by its manufacturer, Italian shipyard Perini Navi, sank while a nearby sailboat remained largely unscathed.

Prosecutors said the event was “extremely rapid” and could have been a “downburst” — a localized, powerful wind that descends from a thunderstorm and spreads out rapidly upon hitting the ground.

The crew was saved, except for the chef, while six passengers were trapped in the hull.

People gather as Don Vincenzo the parish priest of Porticello in the municipality of Santa Flavia, celebrates mass for the victims of the Bayesian shipwreck in Porticello, Italy, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (Alberto Lo Bianco/LaPresse via AP)

People gather as Don Vincenzo the parish priest of Porticello in the municipality of Santa Flavia, celebrates mass for the victims of the Bayesian shipwreck in Porticello, Italy, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (Alberto Lo Bianco/LaPresse via AP)

People gather outside the church as Don Vincenzo the parish priest of Porticello in the municipality of Santa Flavia, celebrated mass for the victims of the Bayesian shipwreck in Porticello, Italy, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (Alberto Lo Bianco/LaPresse via AP)

Flowers were sent out to sea as a tribute as Don Vincenzo the parish priest of Porticello in the municipality of Santa Flavia, celebrated mass for the victims of the Bayesian shipwreck in Porticello, Italy, Sunday, Aug. 25, 2024. (Alberto Lo Bianco/LaPresse via AP)

Italian firefighter divers work at the site of a shipwreck, in Porticello, Sicily, southern Italy, Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024. Divers searching the wreck of the superyacht Bayesian that sank off Sicily on Monday recovered a fifth body on Thursday and continued to search for one more as investigators sought to learn why the vessel sank so quickly. (AP Photo/Salvatore Cavalli)

NEW YORK (AP) — Percival Everett's “James,” his acclaimed retelling of Mark Twain's “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” is a fiction nominee for the National Book Awards. The long list of 10 also includes Rachel Kushner's innovative thriller, “Creation Lake,” and novelist-filmmaker Miranda July's exploration of middle age, “All Fours.”

The National Book Foundation released the fiction list Friday, capping a week of announcements in five competitive categories — fiction, nonfiction, poetry,young people's literature, and books in translation. Judges will narrow the lists to five on Oct. 1, and winners will be announced Nov. 20 during a dinner ceremony in Manhattan, when honorary prizes will be presented to novelist Barbara Kingsolver and publisher-activist Paul Coates.

Two story collections are on the fiction list, Pemi Aguda's “Ghostroots" and Tony Tulathimutte’s “Rejection," and three debut novels, Kaveh Akbar's “Martyr!,” Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s “Catalina" and Sam Sax’s “Yr Dead," which takes place in part outside of Trump Tower in Manhattan. The other fiction nominees are Jessica Anthony's “The Most” and Hisham Matar's “My Friends."

FILE - Percival Everett appears at the 38th American Film Festival in Deauville, Normandy, France on Sept. 5, 2012. (AP Photo/Michel Spingler, File)