‘Radio silence’: Deadly boat crash witnesses say they weren’t interviewed by investigators

As a dead girl’s family pushes for justice, a growing chorus of witnesses say investigators and prosecutors never spoke to them before deciding to file misdemeanor charges against the captain in a one-boat crash that killed the teen and disabled her classmate.

James Gassenheimer and Hilary Candela were returning from a Sunday afternoon on the water when they witnessed the immediate aftermath of the collision that killed a 17-year-old Our Lady of Lourdes Academy student, Luciana ‘Lucy’ Fernandez, and left two classmates with significant head injuries.

Nearly two years later, that horrific scene still gnaws at Gassenheimer and Candela. But the two told the Miami Herald that neither the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC), which investigates boating accidents, nor the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office, interviewed them before wrapping up their case against George Pino.

Candela said he repeatedly called the lead FWC investigator to discuss what he witnessed. He didn’t hear back from him.

“It was bizarre. It just went radio silence,” Candela told the Herald. “The lack of response was odd.”

In lengthy interviews with the Herald, Gassenheimer, 57, and Candela, 53, noted discrepancies between what they witnessed and the FWC investigator’s final report, which the State Attorney’s Office relied on to charge Pino with three misdemeanor counts of careless boating, carrying a maximum penalty of 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.

FWC report disputed — here’s how

The report summed up Pino’s actions in the critical moments after he slammed his boat into a concrete channel marker, sending him, his wife and the 12 teenage girls on the boat into Biscayne Bay:

“... Pino accounted for the occupants of the vessel and noticed that one occupant was unaccounted for. Pino dove underwater beneath [his boat], removed Luciana Fernandez from under the vessel and attempted to keep her afloat. At 6:40 p.m., two Good Samaritan vessels approached and saw the capsized vessel with people in the water. Andrea Knoepffler and Cecilia Pino (daughter), who were in the water, found their friend Katerina Puig who had been ejected and was unconscious. Knoepffler and Pino kept Puig afloat. The Good Samaritan vessels arrived and began recovering people from the water. Occupants of the Good Samaritan vessels called 911 and reported a boating accident with injuries.”

While the FWC report acknowledges Pino pulled Lucy out of the water, the witnesses interviewed by the Herald question the timing of Pino’s actions and the way they were summarized in that single paragraph in the report.

Gassenheimer, Candela and a third witness, Thomas Watson — all among the Good Samaritan boaters that evening — said Lucy had not been found when they came upon the horrific scene. The three said Pino was clinging to the bow of his overturned boat.

Watson said a woman on a nearby boat — he believes it may have been Pino’s wife, Cecelia — was “screaming at the top of her lungs ... Lucy is missing!”

Both Candela and Gassenheimer, at the helm of his open fisherman boat, said Pino told them to be careful not to hit Lucy, who he said was missing.

Candela said he shouted at George Pino to look underneath his boat. “He was dazed, and I said the second time, ‘Go look under the boat. If you don’t, I will,’” Candela said.

Pino then dove under his boat and pulled Lucy out, swimming her to one of the smaller Good Samaritan boats, Gassenheimer and Candela said.

Said Watson: “From what it looked like after the fact, she was right next to him under that boat the whole time, and him being in shock, and I — you know, maybe coming to, he pulled her out from underneath the boat.”

The three witnesses arrived about 30 minutes before the first responders, according to the FWC’s timeline in the report and the witness accounts.

“I was flabbergasted. I could tell you it was factually inaccurate,” Candela said of the report’s description of Pino’s actions.

Gassenheimer said he was “obviously upset to see their rendition of what happened.”

The accounts of Gassenheimer, a Miami attorney, and Candela, an insurance executive and the son of a famed Miami architect, echo that of Watson, who also witnessed the aftermath of the crash and was not contacted by the FWC or the State Attorney’s Office before Pino was charged last August.

READ MORE: Prosecutors didn’t talk to eyewitness before filing misdemeanor charges in deadly boat crash

Watson, an off-duty yacht captain, previously told the Herald he was cruising in his 21-foot center console two boats behind Pino’s boat that Sunday evening during Labor Day weekend 2022. He arrived moments after Pino smashed his 29-foot, twin-engine Robalo into a concrete channel marker at 6:37 p.m., capsizing the boat and hurtling Pino, his wife Cecilia and 12 teenage girls into the bay. Pino was piloting the boat at a speed of approximately 45 mph when he hit the marker, the FWC report said.

The Pinos had taken the girls on the boat to celebrate the 18th birthday of their daughter Cecilia and were returning from Elliott Key to their home in Ocean Reef Club, an exclusive gated community in Key Largo. Investigators later found more than 60 empty booze cans and bottles on Pino’s boat.

Lucy Fernandez died the next day in the hospital. Her classmate Katerina Puig, a star soccer player at Lourdes, has permanent brain damage. A third classmate, Isabella Rodriguez, had a head wound but has since recovered. At the time, Katerina was 17 and Isabella was 16.

Watson told the Herald he was with his two children and his wife Melinda, a registered nurse, when they came upon the crash. Melinda and Gassenheimer, a former lifeguard, each jumped in the water, swam to the boat where Lucy was, and administered CPR to Lucy before first responders arrived.

For nearly two years, Watson said he waited for investigators to call him after he gave his contact information to FWC investigators at the crash scene. They never did.

Gassenheimer and Candela also said they gave their contact information to the FWC investigators at the crash site.

“We never heard from them again,” Gassenheimer told the Miami Herald. “I was shocked.”

The three witnesses interviewed by the Herald disputed Pino’s claim that another boat threw a large wake and caused him to lose control of his boat, each saying the water was calm and they saw no evidence of another boat causing an issue. Though FWC investigators did not interview the three witnesses, the FWC investigator’s report concluded there was no evidence supporting Pino’s claim that another boat caused him to lose control of his Robalo.

“It was very calm. I wouldn’t say it was glassy, but it was as close to glassy as you can get,” Candela said of the water conditions that evening.

Candela has not been interviewed by prosecutors. Within the past few weeks, prosecutors have taken sworn statements from Watson and Gassenheimer, but only after Joel Denaro, a Miami criminal defense attorney representing Lucy’s parents, Andres and Melissa Fernandez, pushed them to do so.

Seeking new charge against Pino

Denaro and the Fernandezes are urging the State Attorney’s Office to file an obstruction of justice charge against Pino because they feel he lied to investigators.

“Our review of the evidence leaves no doubt Mr. Pino lied and in doing so, committed obstruction of justice. Without the truth, the Fernandez family cannot have closure,” Denaro told the Herald. “The Fernandez family is grateful the Good Samaritans are finally being interviewed. Their efforts to render aid were truly heroic.”

The statute of limitations for filing an obstruction of justice charge ends on the two-year anniversary of the crash, on Sept. 4, 2024. Pino, 53, president of State Street Realty in Doral, has pleaded not guilty to the careless boating charges, and that case is pending.

Pino’s attorney, Howard Srebnick, has not returned the Herald’s request for comment on the case.

The State Attorney’s Office has maintained it thoroughly investigated the Pino crash. It would not answer the Herald’s queries about why it did not contact Candela, Gassenheimer or Watson before filing charges against Pino or why it didn’t file an obstruction of justice charge against Pino over his claim that another boat caused him to crash.

During a July 31 hearing, Miami-Dade prosecutor Ruben Scolavino acknowledged that the case involved a “large swath” of people on the scene and that it was “impossible to talk to everyone.” The investigation, he said, remains active.

The FWC issued a statement to the Herald defending its investigation and its decision not to follow up with the witnesses.

“During the course of boating accident investigations, investigators may elect to re-interview subjects or witnesses if they feel that additional, pertinent information may be acquired,’’ the statement said. “If they believe that all pertinent information from a witness has been received or gather additional evidence that corroborates the witness’ statement, follow up contact may not be necessary.

“Of course, nothing precluded any of the Good Samaritans from reaching out to FWC investigators if they felt their statements were insufficient, or if they had additional information they felt was pertinent to the case.”

Police found more than 60 empty booze containers on the boat when it was pulled from the water the day after the crash, and Pino is recorded on police body camera footage declining to submit blood to test for alcohol because he had “two beers.”

The Puig family, in a March 2023 civil lawsuit that has since been settled for millions of dollars, contend the Pinos provided all of the underage girls with alcohol that day, an accusation the couple, through their attorneys, denied.

Read More: 61 booze containers on crashed boat in Keys — and parents outraged over minor charges

Boaters do CPR while waiting for medics

The witnesses and FWC described a frantic scene on the water.

Two girls — the Pinos’ daughter Cecilia and her friend, Andrea Knoepffler — found Katerina Puig, who was unconscious, in the water. They kept Puig afloat, the report said.

Watson said people on the smaller boat pulled Lucy on board. His wife swam over and helped perform CPR on her.

Gassenheimer, a lifeguard in high school and college, said he and three women, all nurses — including Melinda Watson — did CPR in shifts on Lucy in the boat waiting for help to arrive.

“It’s something you never forget,” he said about his CPR training. “It all came back to me very quickly.”

Candela asked the people on one of the other boats if they called the Coast Guard. Although they were on the phone with 911 operators, he called the Coast Guard on VHF channel 16, which is the quickest way to get emergency help on the water.

Both Gassenheimer and Candela said they can only guesstimate how long it took for first responders to arrive.

“My adrenaline was racing, so it was probably longer than I thought. Between 20 and 40 minutes, but that is a rough estimate,” Gassenheimer said. “By the time we were done, we were each doing five rounds of chest compressions. I was exhausted.”

According to the narrative in the FWC report, the first rescue units — first responders from Miami-Dade Police and the U.S. Coast Guard arrived on boats at 7:12 p.m., 35 minutes from the time of the accident. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue and the FWC arrived at 7:31 p.m., the report said.

Around 7:35 p.m., Lucy, who was “unconscious and not breathing” was choppered out by Miami-Dade Fire Air Rescue to Kendall Regional Medical Center, the FWC report said. She died the next day at the hospital. Her cause of death was drowning, the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner ruled.

Lag time in getting to the injured

Candela said he could see Katerina and Isabella unconscious, lying on the deck of a yacht, one of the first Good Samaritan boats on the scene, and he urged rescuers to get to them. Gassenheimer piloted his boat toward the yacht, but FWC officers told them not to get near the boat, both men said. By that time, an Ocean Reef Fire Rescue boat was also on scene, Candela said.

“It was one of the more devastating things I could experience,” said Candela. “How do you not see two girls on the platform of the boat? It’s one of those things that stays with me. It’s one of those shocking moments.”

Isabella has since made a full recovery, sources say. But, Candela said he believes Katerina’s injuries might have been less severe if rescuers were able to get her off the yacht and to a medivac helicopter sooner.

“My opinion, yes, it would have made a difference if I could have gone to see Katerina Puig somehow,” he said. “I would have put her on my boat and gotten her to Ocean Reef. We were the fourth vessel there, and we were the first to call Coast Guard.”

According to the Puigs’ civil lawsuit, Katerina didn’t arrive at the docks at Ocean Reef until 8:40 p.m., and didn’t get to Nicklaus Children’s Hospital, where she was transported by Monroe County’s helicopter ambulance, until 9:07 p.m.

“I still can’t get those images out of my head. Every time it comes up how it was handled, it makes me angry. It’s very difficult,” Gassenheimer said.

Read More: Two tragic Keys boat crashes, two vastly different charges. FWC denies special treatment

Reached out to FWC investigator, but to no avail

Early on, Candela was contacted by FWC investigator William Thompson, who wrote the FWC’s final report on the crash.

But Hurricane Ian devastated Florida’s Gulf Coast in late September 2022, and Thompson was sent to Fort Myers, along with scores of other FWC officers, to help with search-and-rescue efforts, according to Candela.

In October of that year, Candela said Thompson told him he could not meet with him because his FWC truck had water damage from Fort Myers. This was the last time Candela said he heard from Thompson, despite Candela making repeated attempts to reach him.

Both Candela and Gassenheimer said they remain confused about how the tragedy was investigated.

“I have been a commercial litigation attorney since 1992. You always interview all witnesses before you make any decisions,” Gassenheimer said.

As the two friends decompressed that night from all the trauma they witnessed, Candela said he recalls Gassenheimer preparing him for perhaps the days of questioning they both thought lay ahead from investigators.

“I remember James saying, ‘Make sure you remember everything because there’s going to be a lot of testimony and depositions.’ This is the kind of thing you expect, the onslaught, and it never happened,” Candela told the Herald. “The investigation that should have occurred didn’t occur. It’s shocking.”

Miami Herald staff writer Grethel Aguila contributed to this report.

This story was originally published August 20, 2024 at 4:38 PM.

David Goodhue

Miami Herald

305-923-9728

David Goodhue covers the Florida Keys and South Florida for FLKeysNews.com and the Miami Herald. Before joining the Herald, he covered Congress, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C. He is a graduate of the University of Delaware.