Richard Fogel/AP
LOS ANGELES — A federal judge in Los Angeles on Thursday sentenced the captain of a scuba diving boat to four years in prison and three years of supervised release for criminal negligence after a fire on board killed 34 people.
The September 2, 2019, fire was the deadliest maritime disaster in recent U.S. history, sparking changes in maritime regulations, Congressional reform, and several ongoing lawsuits.
Captain Jerry Boylan was found guilty last year of misconduct or failure to act against a seaman. The charge is an antebellum statute known colloquially as seaman's manslaughter. It was designed to make steamship captains and crews responsible for maritime disasters.
The families petitioned U.S. District Judge George Wu in a heated hearing to sentence Boylan to up to 10 years in prison. Many people cried and Robert Kurtz, the father of the only slain deckhand, Alexandra Kurtz, brought a small container to the podium to address Boylan and the court.
“This is all I know about my daughter,” he said.
Yadira Alvarez, the mother of 16-year-old Berenice Felipe, who volunteered at an animal shelter and dreamed of becoming a marine biologist, was the youngest of the 34 victims who died on the boat. was.
“He's not the victim. It's his fault that my daughter isn't here,” Alvarez tearfully said in court. “Can you imagine my pain?”
The Conception was anchored off the coast of Santa Cruz Island, 25 miles (40 kilometers) south of Santa Barbara, when the fire broke out before dawn on the final day of the three-day trip, less than 100 feet (30 meters) from shore. It sank.
Thirty-three passengers and one crew member were trapped in their bunks below deck and died. Among the dead were deckhands who had landed their dream jobs. An environmental scientist who conducted research in Antarctica. A couple traveling around the world. Singaporean data scientist. His family consists of three sisters, his father and his wife.
Boylan was the first to abandon ship and jump into the sea. The four crew members who joined the ship also survived.
During the hearing, Boylan's lawyer read a statement in court in which Boylan expressed his condolences and said he had cried every day since the fire.
“I wish we could have brought everyone home safely,” he said in a statement. “very sorry.”
Wu said he considered Boylan's age, health, likelihood of relapse, and the need for deterrence and punishment when deciding on sentencing.
He said that while Boylan's actions were reckless, the sentencing guidelines did not justify a 10-year sentence.
“It's not a situation where the defendant intended anything bad,” Wu said.
The defense had asked the judge to sentence Boylan to a five-year suspended sentence, followed by three years of house arrest.
Mr. Boylan's appeal continues.
Hank Garcia, whose son Daniel was among the victims, said he's not a vengeful person, but he and other family members don't want something like this to happen again.
“We all have life sentences,” he told the court. “Without the people we love, we are sentenced to life in prison.”
“While today's sentence will not completely heal their wounds, we hope that our efforts to hold this defendant criminally accountable will bring some measure of healing to the family,” U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada said in a statement. ” he said.
Thursday's sentencing was the final step in a fraught prosecution that has dragged on for nearly five years and has repeatedly frustrated the victims' families.
A grand jury in 2020 initially indicted Boylan on 34 counts of manslaughter, meaning he could face a total of 340 years in prison. Boylan's attorney argued that the deaths were the result of a single incident rather than separate crimes, so prosecutors filed a superseding indictment charging Boylan with only one count.
In 2022, Wu dismissed the superseding indictment, saying it failed to find that Boylan acted with gross negligence. Prosecutors were then forced to appear before a grand jury again.
The exact cause of the Conception fire is still unknown, but prosecutors and defense tried to determine who was responsible during a 10-day trial last year.
The government said Mr. Boylan failed to staff the required night patrols and did not properly train his personnel in firefighting. With no patrolling observers, the fire spread unnoticed throughout the 23-metre-long boat.
But Mr. Boylan's lawyers tried to shift the blame onto Glenn Fritzler. Glenn Fritzler owned Truth Aquatics with his wife, and often operated the Conception and two other scuba diving boats around the Channel Islands. They cited Mr. Fritzler's failure to train his crew in firefighting and other safety measures, and his lax seafaring practices known as the “Fritzler style,'' in which none of the captains working under him were on patrol watch. He claimed that he was responsible for creating culture.
The Fritzlers have not spoken publicly about the tragedy since an interview with a local television station days after the fire. Their lawyers did not respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press.
The conclusion of the criminal case has focused attention on several ongoing lawsuits.
Three days after the fire, Truth Aquatics filed suit under a provision of antebellum maritime law that allowed liability to be limited to the value of the wreckage of a totaled boat. The owners of the Titanic and other ships have successfully used this tried-and-true legal tool, and the Fritzlers will now have to prove they are not at fault.
The lawsuit is pending, along with other lawsuits brought by victims' families against the Coast Guard over lax enforcement of patrol watch duties.
After Thursday's ruling, Susana Solano, who lost her three daughters and her father on the boat, said she and other family members hope the judge will hear their plea.
“It's very disappointing,” she said. “It's just heartbreaking.”