A prominent Miami commercial real estate broker was found not guilty by a jury in connection to a 2022 boat crash that left one teenager dead and another with permanent disabilities.
Fox News reports George Pino, president of State Street Realty, was accused of driving his boat into a channel marker in Biscayne Bay during his daughter’s 18th birthday celebration over the Labor Day weekend four years ago. He was charged with second-degree manslaughter and vessel homicide for the crash that killed 17-year-old Lucy Fernandez and left another teen, Katy Puig, now 21, with a traumatic brain injury.
Pino’s attorneys convinced the jury that the collision was an accident.
“We are grateful to the jurors for their careful consideration of the evidence and for reaching a just verdict,” lead defense attorney Howard Srebnick said in a statement. “From the beginning, we have maintained that the events of Sept. 4, 2022, were a tragic accident, not a crime. 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.”
Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez-Rundle expressed disappointment in the verdict.
“While everyone in our community and beyond recognizes the tragedy surrounding the Labor Day 2022 boating death of Lucy Fernandez and the permanent disabling of Katy Puig, my prosecutors and I have believed that the totality of George Pino’s actions on the waters of Biscayne Bay were reckless and constituted a crime as defined by Florida’s criminal statutes,” she said in a statement. “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. 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.”
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