LOS ANGELES—Federal prosecutors said Wednesday that the captain of a scuba dive boat should be held responsible for the deaths of 34 people killed in a fire aboard the vessel in 2019, while the captain’s defense attorneys said the boat’s owner is to blame in the deadliest maritime disaster in recent U.S. history.
The conflicting accounts were presented Wednesday during opening statements in the Los Angeles trial of Jerry Boylan, who is charged with one count of misconduct or neglect of ship officer, a pre-Civil War statute colloquially known as “seaman’s manslaughter” that was designed to hold steamboat captains and crew responsible for maritime disasters.
