Two boat operators charged in wakeboarding girl's death in South Florida

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MIAMI (AP) — Misdemeanor charges have filed against the man who was operating the boat that fatally struck a 15-year-old girl off a South Florida beach last year, as well as the man who was operating the boat she had been wakeboarding behind, authorities announced Tuesday.

Carlos Guillermo Alonso, 79, was charged April 28 with violating two U.S. Coast Guard navigational rules, and Edmund Richard Hartley, 31, was charged April 29 with violating four Coast Guard rules, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission said in a press release.

Attorneys for Alonso and Hartley didn't immediately respond to emails seeking comment. They have both pleaded not guilty.

In May 2024, 15-year-old Ella Adler and another girl were wakeboarding behind a 42-foot (13-meter) Hanse Fjord walk-around near Key Biscayne, just south of Miami, before falling off at different spots, officials said. A dozen people had been on the boat pulling Adler.

Before the vessel, operated by Hartley, could return to collect her, Adler was hit by another boat, which immediately sped away, officials said. Witnesses described the hit-and-run craft as a center console boat with a light blue hull, multiple white outboard engines and blue bottom paint.

Investigators eventually found the boat, a Boston whaler, docked behind Alonso's Coral Gables home. His attorneys have previously said he didn't realize he had stuck anyone with his boat and was cooperating with authorities.

Adler was a freshman at Ransom Everglades School in Coconut Grove and a ballerina with the Miami City Ballet.