The “devastated” mentor of the luxury Manhattan jeweler who vanished when the Bayesian yacht sank off Sicily spoke with her protége days before the tragedy — and admitted she has little hope that the missing passengers will be found alive. In an exclusive interview with The Post, goldsmith Cecelia Bauer recalled inviting Neda Morvillo to a luncheon with fellow jewelers on Monday, the same day the superyacht capsized off the coast of Palermo. Morvillo, who has a fine jewelry business in Midtown, and her lawyer husband Christopher Morvillo are among the six people who went missing during the tragedy.
But officials are holding out hope they may be trapped in the ship alive, surviving on air pockets 160 feet below the surface. “I’m totally shocked,” Bauer said upon learning her former student and Morvillo’s husband were aboard the doomed yacht. “I’m devastated because I can’t believe she’s one of the missing.
It doesn’t look good ...
I would find it hard to believe that anyone has survived this long.” Bauer told The Post she trained the missing jeweler approximately 20 years ago. A website for Morvillo — who goes professionally as Neda Nassiri — credits Bauer as her mentor.
“She was a student of mine,” Bauer said. “She came to my studio and she studied with me for many, many years, and she was able to go out on her own, and get her own studio and a place to work. “She became a very close friend.
She’s very dear to me. And this news is jus.