Jury finds George Pino not guilty in Miami boat crash that killed teenage girl

A jury on Monday night found Doral real estate broker George Pino not guilty of felony charges stemming from a boat crash that killed a teen girl.

Pino, 54, cried when the verdict was read. The jury, made up of five men and one woman, found Pino not guilty of manslaughter and vessel homicide charges in the Sept. 4, 2022, boat crash in Biscayne Bay. Luciana “Lucy” Fernandez, 17, was killed, and Katerina “Katy” Puig, now 21, another passenger, was left with physical and neurological disabilities.

The jury deliberated for more than an hour.

Pino’s supporters sighed and sniffled when the verdict was announced. Loved ones of Lucy were stoic and quiet and rushed out of the courtroom once jurors were excused. Pino gestured a “thank you” to jurors and then embraced his friends and family while sobbing.

READ MORE: Jury deliberates: Was fatal boat crash just an accident — or was Pino reckless?

In a statement after the verdict, defense attorney Howard Srebnick said he was grateful that jurors carefully considered the evidence to reach a just verdict.

“From the beginning, we have maintained that the events of September 4, 2022, were a tragic accident, not a crime,” Srebnick said. “The testimony presented at trial, including unrebutted accounts from eyewitnesses who saw no signs of impairment, confirmed that Mr. Pino was not under the influence, was not operating the vessel recklessly and that he did everything he could to protect his passengers after the accident.”

After the verdict, Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said in a statement that her office decided to charge Pino with a felony after determining that there was sufficient evidence that Pino’s actions were reckless, although the jury ultimately disagreed.

“Sadly, I know that this verdict brings no comfort to the Fernandez and Puig families who forever must live with the tragedy of what happened,” Fernandez Rundle said. “In a case like this, there are no winners or losers. Mr. Pino must live with what he did, while the Fernandez and Puig families will grapple with the consequences of his actions.”

The Fernandez family declined to comment when reached by the Herald about the verdict. The Puig family did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Pino was taking his wife, Cecilia, their daughter and 11 of his daughter’s friends back to the Ocean Reef Club in north Key Largo that night from an afternoon outing on Elliott Key. The outing was to celebrate the daughter’s 18th birthday. There was a dinner planned at Ocean Reef at 9 p.m.

During closing arguments, prosecutor Laura Adams said Pino operated the boat recklessly when he sped through the Cutter Bank channel at 47 mph, very fast for a boat. He operated his 29-foot Robalo on the wrong side of the channel and ultimately rammed into the steel marker.

The boat capsized, and the 14 passengers were hurtled into the bay. Lucy was trapped under the boat and died the next day in the hospital.

“This isn’t blowing a stop sign,” Adams told the jury during closing arguments Monday morning in Pino’s trial. “This is blowing into the stop sign while on the wrong sign of the road when you’ve been drinking.”

Defense attorney Howard Srebnick, however, argued that the crash was a tragic accident — and did not amount to a crime.

“He may have committed human error … but that does not make him a criminal,” Srebnick said.

The trial was one of the most anticipated in recent years due to Pino’s prominence in South Florida and because the investigation was controversial from the start.

Prosecutors reopen case

Pino was initially charged in August 2026 with three counts of careless boating, a minor misdemeanor carrying a minimum sentence of 60 days in county jail. However, following a series of Miami Herald stories detailing flaws in the investigation, including police not following up with key eyewitnesses, the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office reexamined the case and charged Pino with vessel homicide in October 2024.

Prosecutors added the manslaughter charge in early 2025 after several of the girls on the boat gave sworn statements that they drank heavily from booze stashed in a cooler on Pino’s boat. Both charges are second-degree felonies punishable by up to 15 years in prison.

Pino told the lead Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission investigator on scene that night that he had “two beers.” FWC investigators found 61 empty or partially empty alcoholic containers on the boat when it was salvaged from the water the next day.

Nevertheless, Pino did not face boating under the influence charges. The FWC, which investigates all fatal boat crashes in Florida, never gave him a sobriety test or took his blood to test for alcohol the night of the crash. His attorneys contend the containers found on Pino’s boat were collected from other friends’ vessels partying with them on the sandbar that day.

And, several witnesses testified at the trial that they didn’t observe Pino showing signs of intoxication before or after the crash. Pino did not testify during the trial.

Another controversy during the trial was the reason Pino had given for crashing into the channel marker. Until the weeks before the trial, Pino told investigators that another boat coming at him in the channel caused him to lose control of his vessel and crash.

But, no one else, including the people on his Robalo or other boaters in the channel, saw that other boat. Months later, he made the same claim in a sworn statement in a civil case the Puigs filed against the Pinos.

However, in the weeks before the trial started, Pino’s attorneys filed a flurry of motions, including one that would exclude the jury from hearing about the other boat. During the trial, Diana Barratt, a Boca Raton neurologist hired by the defense, testified that the other boat theory was a result of Pino's memory being clouded because he suffered traumatic brain injury on impact with the channel marker.

Barratt, when questioned by Adams, testified that Pino’s brain scan was normal.

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