[Camerota:] A New Jersey man died suddenly on vacation last week in the Dominican Republic. He is the ninth American tourist to die there this year under mysterious circumstances. Fifty-five-year- old Joseph Allen was found dead last Thursday in his hotel room. His family is demanding answers as to exactly what happened. So joining us now is Joseph's brother, Jason Allen. Jason, we're glad that you're here, but we're so sorry for your loss and how sudden and what a shock it was.
[Jason Allen, Brother Died In The Dominican Republic Last Week:] Thank you.
[Camerota:] What do you think happened to your brother there?
[Allen:] I think that maybe my brother was either he either was given something to drink or he ate something that didn't wasn't what it was supposed to be. And that might have caused his death.
[Camerota:] Was your brother sick? Did your brother have any health issues, any heart issues of any kind?
[Allen:] No, ma'am. He had just gotten a physical prior to his trip. He had a clean bill of health. And there's no reason we have no reason to believe that his death was of natural causes.
[Camerota:] You know, there's been this spate of mysterious deaths in the Dominican Republic. And these are not deaths that have easy answers. I mean, for instance, there was this couple just a couple of weeks ago who both died at their resort. There have been other visitors to the Dominican Republic who had said that they felt that they were poisoned somehow, not intentionally, but when they came they got so sick that they felt that they were even unintentionally poisoned. Is that the theory your working theory?
[Allen:] That's what I'm thinking. You know, I know that my brother had a fever. He complained about being really hot. His friend looked at him. He was sweating bullets. Took a shower, cooled off, said he felt a lot better. He was going to hang out that night, decided, you know what, I feel better but I don't feel well enough to hang you know, to go hand out, so I'm just going to relax in the room and read. And, so, like you said, I don't believe it was something intentional per say, but there's something that's off. I have no reason to believe my brother was very healthy, just got a clean bill of health from his physician, and I have no reason to believe that he just dropped dead for no reason.
[Camerota:] Did all of the news reports of what had been happening in the Dominican Republic for the past few weeks, did that give your brother any pause?
[Allen:] It's funny you ask that. I had mentioned this to him, and because he had been to this place so many different times
[Camerota:] This resort in particular?
[Allen:] This resort in particular. He knew the owners. This was like his "Cheers." Like, he knew the owners. He knew the workers. My brother was a working man. He treated the workers kindly, with respect. So everyone knew my brother, loved my brother. So he and I mentioned it to him. I even sent him and he was in the DR at the time when David Ortiz got shot. I said, man, the DR's kind of crazy right now, you sure you want to be there? And he just assured me that nothing would happen to him. He knows everybody. He's not a tourist. He's going to be here. He's going to be in this place and this is and he'll be fine.
[Camerota:] So you're asking for help. You you need the embassy's help. I mean what are you I know the State Department has reached out to you now. What do you need their help with?
[Allen:] Right now my goal is to, one, get my my brother back get my brother's body back to the United States.
[Camerota:] So you can do an autopsy?
[Allen:] Well, they actually performed an autopsy when on the Friday.
[Camerota:] And what did they find?
[Allen:] We don't know. We haven't gotten any information as far as their the findings of the autopsy, and they actually were told that they had to embalm they told us that we they had to embalm my brother so that he could be sent back to the states. We later learned that that was not accurate, that there's other ways to transport a body from the states to the states from the Dominican Republic. So we'd like to try to if if we don't feel like we're getting the help we need from them and answers that we need from them, we'd like to get some kind of testing done on American soil by American doctors to help us to understand what could have been the cause of my brother's death.
[Camerota:] Understood. Of course you just want answers and you need help with the investigation. Jason Allen, thank you so much for being here. We're really sorry about the loss of Joseph. Please keep us posted as to what you find out.
[Allen:] We'll do. Thank you so much.
[Camerota:] OK, we'll be right back.
[Berman:] Our heart goes out to that family. Some news just into us, Hope Hicks, the president's former aide, just arrived on Capitol Hill. She will testify behind closed doors to the House Judiciary Committee. There is a conflict already over claims of executive privilege. We'll bring you the very latest developments as we get them in, next.