Testimony of girls on boat leads to new charge for George Pino, sources say

Miami Herald

5 days ago

The testimony of the girls on the boat operated by Doral real estate broker George Pino when it crashed during the 2022 Labor Day weekend prompted Miami prosecutors to charge Pino with manslaughter, sources told the Miami Herald.
Prosecutors filed the new charge Thursday. Pino, 54, was already charged with vessel homicide, a nearly identical felony charge that also carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison.
Both charges are for killing 17-year-old Luciana 'Lucy' Fernandez, who was starting her senior year at Our Lady of Lourdes Academy. The Sept. 4, 2022, crash seriously injured her classmate, Katerina 'Katy' Puig, 20, a standout soccer player now confined to a wheelchair and still struggling to regain basic motor skills.
The new charge reads that Pino 'intentionally committed an act or acts, and/or acted with culpable negligence .... which caused the death of Luciana Fernandez.'
Pino's defense attorney Howard Srebnick could not be immediately reached for comment.
On the day of the crash, there were 12 teenage girls on the boat; Pino's daughter, Cecilia, had just turned 18 and had invited 11 of her girlfriends to celebrate on the boating excursion with her parents, George and Cecilia Pino.
Sources say several of the girls detailed the events leading up to the crash — including how much alcohol was flowing on the boat hours before — in recent interviews with Pino's attorneys.
Records reviewed by the Miami Herald confirm at least one of the girls was drinking heavily that day. Puig's toxicology report from Nicklaus Children's Hospital near South Miami, where she was airlifted the night of the crash, shows her blood alcohol level was almost twice the .08% legal limit for driving. Her test was taken at 10:33 p.m., four hours after the crash.
MORE: FWC chair questions why no sobriety test of Pino in fatal boat crash, emails show
The day after the crash, the FWC found a stash of empty booze bottles and cans on Pino's boat when its officers pulled it from the bay. The boat had capsized, hurtling the 14 people into the bay. Three girls were unconscious when they were pulled from the water — Lucy, who died the next day in the hospital; Katy, then 17, who suffered traumatic brain injury; and Isabella Rodriguez, then 16, who had a brain bleed but has since recovered.
Srebnick, Pino's attorney, has said the empty booze containers were from five boats tied up that day although he hasn't said who were on the other boats. READ MORE: How investigators, prosecutors bungled probe into boat crash that killed teen girl
The Herald's investigation found FWC officers violated their training when they did not give Pino a sobriety test, despite the crash involving serious injuries and Pino telling the lead investigator that he had 'two beers.' The FWC's training manual and a slideshow presentation prepared by the State Attorney's Office for the FWC list significant injuries and deaths in a boat crash as probable cause for a blood draw in a sobriety test.
Investigators on the scene knew that four of the 14 people on the boat were airlifted as trauma alert patients by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, including Lucy.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission also could have contacted the State Attorney's Office, which has a prosecutor on call 24/7 to help officers get a search warrant, arrest warrants and court orders in these types of cases. In fact, the second page of a State Attorney Office's slideshow for the FWC on vessel homicides gives the hotline number for the prosecutors. The FWC didn't call.
This report will be updated as more information becomes available