A federal judge has sentenced tugboat captain Yusiel Lopez Insua, 47, to 18 months in prison for a July 2025 collision on Biscayne Bay that killed three children. U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Becerra imposed a longer term than the 12 months and one day, followed by six months of home detention, that prosecutors and the defense had jointly proposed.

Insua was at the helm of the 25-foot tug Wood Chuck, pushing a 60-foot construction barge, when it struck a stalled 17-foot sailboat carrying a camp counselor and five children near Hibiscus and Monument islands in Miami Beach. Three children, ages 7, 10 and 13, drowned after becoming trapped in the wreckage; the counselor and two other children survived.

Federal prosecutors charged Insua with seaman’s manslaughter, citing a forward view blocked by the tug’s deckhouse and crane, no additional lookout, and internet activity on his phone during the transit. He pleaded guilty in July. The case was investigated by the Coast Guard Investigative Service, Coast Guard Sector Miami and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

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