All right. Once you begin, don't stop. Just do it to the best of your ability. >> Do you understand? Yes, ma'am. That was that was part of the instructions. Okay. Hold on a minute. I didn't tell you to begin. Wait. Med with your medicine, whatever it may be. But your normal factories are impaired. Ma'am, >> everything about this stop looks wrong at first glance. It's nearly night. The vehicle is a jet ski, and the officers pulling it over aren't on a road. They're on [music] a patrol boat. Spotlight cutting across dark water toward a single rider. She's an Instagram influencer out for a last run as the light dies. And she's about to collide with two laws almost nobody on a personal watercraft has ever heard of. One of them is about the clock. The other is about what's in her blood. [music] By 8:05 that evening, she'll be under arrest. And by the end of this video, you'll understand exactly why the water cops were right where she was at exactly the hour most riders assume no one is watching. Stop looking that way. There's nothing there is going to save you. I need you here. >> Come here. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. Where are we headed to? >> My house. >> Your house. >> Thank God. >> Thank God. Okay. Why? Why? Thank God. >> Because it's dark. >> Yeah. Man, what time are you supposed to be off the water? >> About a minute ago. >> Yeah, about a minute ago. Where are we coming from? >> From down there. >> Where's down there? What? What? I don't know what's down there. >> I was just trying to >> You don't understand. But where were you coming from? >> Um, so before the inlet, turn left. >> You were at the sandbar all day. You were at like a person's house. You were at >> a restaurant. Oh, you're just cruising. Okay, that's fine. Let me get your license and registration. What's the cops? All right. Do you have your the registration? Start with the law that put the spotlight on her in the first place because it surprises almost everyone. In Florida, jet skis have a curfew. A personal watercraft may not be operated from half an hour after sunset until half an hour before sunrise. Full stop. No exceptions for calm water or short rides or being almost home. The reason is brutal and simple. A jet ski is small, low to the water, carries minimal lighting, and moves fast. After dark, it becomes close to invisible, to boats, to barges, to everything big enough to kill its rider without ever feeling the impact. So, the state simply takes the machine off the board at night. Most casual riders have never read that statute. Rental shops mention it in a waiver nobody studies. Even lifelong boat owners are often stunned to learn the machine they let their kids loop around the bay carries a legal cutoff tied to the sun. And enforcement isn't optional for the officers either. After dark, PWC riders are a leading source of night collisions and drownings. [music] So evening patrols treat a moving jet ski silhouette the way a trooper treats a car doing 90 with its headlights off. That gap between what the law says and what riders assume is precisely where this stop begins. An FWC patrol crew working the evening water, watching a jet ski that should not have been out there at all and closing in before the dark finished falling. The officers bring her alongside and the conversation starts easily where she's headed, whether she knows the hour. Then comes the question every impaired driving investigation on land or water eventually reaches. How much have you had to drink tonight? Her answer arrives in the exact words officers have heard a thousand times. Not a lot. Press gently. It becomes two beers. Remember that phrase. In DUI enforcement, it is so universal it's nearly a punchline. Almost no one, sober or drunk, ever volunteers a bigger number. But the officers aren't really listening to the count. They're watching everything around it. The eyes they describe as red. The smell of alcohol they note on her breath. The small delays and corrections in how she answers. A number can be negotiated. The body's tells can't >> Yes. The registration numbers are this number. >> Oh, you wrote the registration. >> This is it. >> Yeah. >> Whose jet ski is this? >> Um, mine and Peter at home. >> He's at home. Uh, >> let me get your You have a whistle? And where's home again, ma'am? Sorry. >> It's up there. >> You're good. I can see your whistle. >> I can see it. Yeah, you don't have to take it off. You're good. >> Fire extinguisher. 529. I got the email. >> How often do you use this vessel? >> All right. >> Okay. That's what I was asking. >> Yeah. >> All right, ma'am. You have to go and put it down. >> Watch your glasses. >> Watch your glasses. >> All right. And then start. Oh, well I stopped by. >> Okay. >> The ice cream. >> Am I ready? >> Um, how much you had to drink today? >> I asked. >> There's also a practical reason the officers take their time here. Unlike a roadside, there's no backup unit rolling up behind them and no camera covered shoulder. Just two vessels rafted together on open water. So every judgment call has to be made carefully, verbally, and on the [music] record. What they were seeing and hearing, they decided, was enough to move this from a chat about the curfew to something more formal. The curfew violation opened the door. What was on her breath walked the investigation through it. What happens next is a piece of marine patrol procedure that looks odd until you think it through. They move her off the jet ski entirely and onto their patrol boat. There's no shoulder to pull onto out here. No flat pavement to stand a suspect on. >> Smell as much as what I'm smelling right now. >> Probably two beers. >> Two beers. Okay. Where at? And at what time? >> One at home, one with ice. >> Okay. And then how much have you have you drank today or ate today? >> FL 98 37. >> You ate a lot today? >> Yeah. I'm a fish. >> Okay. Nice. When was the last time you ate? >> 54 291 >> that all in your Put it in. Yeah. >> Put it all. Yeah. Put it all in there for me. >> Yeah. Just actually I'll just I'll just hold on to it. We'll hold on to it real quick. >> That's fine. >> Thank you. this one. So, what we're going to do right now because like I said, I I detect and show signs that I might be impaired. So, >> and no officer wants a possibly impaired person perched on a floating motorcycle while they run tests. So, the patrol deck becomes the roadside. It's worth pausing on how disorienting that moment must be. On land, a traffic stop has a script everyone half knows from movies. On the water, at dusk, being brought aboard a law enforcement vessel feels like something else entirely. And you can read that dawning realization in the footage. This is no longer a warning about riding late. Seated on a stranger's boat, engine idling beneath her, she's now the subject of a full impairment investigation. And the next several minutes will decide whether she rides home or rides to jail. >> Right now it's called see this field of riding task. Okay. So basically that's see that this right here is just the sandbar, the jet ski, ride without goggles, whatever it may be. Okay? Okay? Or this is your normal self cuz right now, like I said, you're giving me indicators that you might be impaired operating this. Okay? You understand? Okay. All right. So, the first thing I need you to sit on the edge of the seat, scoot up a little bit. Okay? Right there. Put your feet shoulderwidth apart. All right. Are you comfortable? You're not comfortable. Are you stable? Do you feel like you're going to fall over? Okay. You feel like you are or not? Okay. Do you feel like you're good? That's what I'm saying. >> Yeah, I just feel >> Okay, that's fine. Nerves are understanding. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Nerves are understanding. Okay. >> I'm fine. All right. So, >> what's your name, ma'am? >> Lauren. What? >> L I L >> L I L A. What's your date of birth? >> Then the tests begin. And if you've only ever seen the roadside version, this will look unfamiliar. Nobody walks a line on a boat. The marine battery is built for a moving deck, and it's done entirely seated. The officer's finger sweeps across her field of vision while he watches her eyes, hunting for the involuntary stutter that alcohol writes into the muscles of the eye. A twitch no willpower can smooth out. >> So, is a sinus infection or a staff infection? >> Both. Both. >> Both sinus infection or staff. establish the bacteria. >> Okay. All right. All right. So, here we go. First thing I'm going to do. All right. Uh, do you have any uh contacts you wearing? No. >> You wearing contacts? Yeah. >> Hard or soft? >> Soft. You like daily you change them out? Okay. All right. All right. First thing I'm going to do, you're going to keep your head still and you're going to follow my finger. Okay. Do we understand? >> You're going to follow my finger. This is the stimulus. Okay. With your eyes and your eyes only, keep your head still. You understand? Change it to a not change it, but tell them I'm busy right now. All right. Are you ready? >> Yeah. >> I can't see that. >> Okay. Just keep looking at try to try to reach it all the way up. Okay. Look all the way at it. Okay. Look all the way here. There you go. Now, there you go. Now, you're looking all the way at Okay. >> All the way here. There you go. >> You're You're looking over here, ma'am. I need you to look over here at the complete >> next. Eyes closed. head back. She's asked to bring a fingertip to the tip of her nose on command. Left hand, right hand, a task that quietly measures whether her brain still knows where her own hands are in space. Simple. Seated, almost polite, and devastatingly effective because none of it can be gamed the way words can. >> Dude, my eyes don't turn that far. >> Your eyes go that far. I promise you. Okay, if you just continue to look right here. All right. See this? Follow this all the way over. Don't try to glance at it of the peripherals. I need you to look right at it. You understand? >> All right. Here we go. All right. The next thing we're going to do, it's called finger the nose. All right. Make a fixed. All right. Make a fist just like this. And put your put your finger out just like that. Both hands. All right. Put them down to your side. All right. Stay just like that. Okay. All right. Do we understand? Okay. All right. When I tell you to begin, you're going to tilt your head back. Okay. 45. When I tell you to begin, you're going to tilt your head back 45° and close your eyes as such. Do you understand? >> Yeah. >> Okay. When I tell you to, you're going to take the tip of your finger. All right. I want you to look. This is the tip of your finger. Okay? That's the tip of your finger right here. This is the pad. This is the side. This is the tip of your finger. Do we understand? You're going to take the tip of your finger and if this was the tip of your nose, you're going to touch the tip of your nose and bring it back down when I tell you what hand. You need me explain that to you again? Do you understand that? >> Okay. All right. So, when I tell you to use your left, you'll say you when I say left, you'll use your left index finger. When I say right, you'll use your right index finger. Do we understand? Okay. All right. Begin. >> Two beers is a claim. An eye that jerks and a finger that lands on a cheek are data. Courts have accepted this seated marine battery for years precisely because it strips balance out of the equation. No defense attorney can blame a rocking deck for what the eyes do on their own. Watch her attempts in real time and you can see the machinery of the decision assembling itself. Each miss noted aloud, each instruction repeated. [music] The officer narrating for the camera as much as for her. >> All right, go ahead and put it down. >> Right. Go ahead and put it down. Left. Go ahead and put it down. Right. Go ahead and put it down. Right. Go ahead and put it down. Left. Go ahead and put it down. Go ahead and open your eyes. All right. All right. Next thing we're going to do is called the palm pad. Take one hand and put it on top of the other. Just like that. All right. Just like that. Stay in that position while I explain the instructions. Okay. All right. When I tell you to, what you're going to do is you're going to take the top hand. Okay. And you're going to turn it over as such. And you're going to count one. And then you're going to turn it back over and count two. Keeping your hands parallel. Do we understand? Okay. I'll do it again. Watch. One. Two. That's how you're going to count. Do you understand? >> Yeah. >> Parallel to what? The ground. >> Parallel to your hand. This hand right here is going to stay parallel. So, it's going to do just like this. Okay. One. No. No. Don't. Stay here. I'll do it. One. Two. One. two. Do we understand? >> You'll continue to do that and as you do it, you're going to you're going to get faster. One, two, one, two, one, two, one, two. Do not stop until I tell you to stop. Do we understand? >> Do we understand the instructions? >> Okay. >> Go ahead and begin. >> According to the officers running the tests, the data kept coming back the same way. And by the end of the sequence, the outcome had stopped being a question. >> Do you understand? All right. There's four tasks you're going to have to do. All right. The first task you're going to do is you're going to in a step-like fashion count one 2 3 4. Okay. Then you're going to memorize this position. You're going to clap. One, two, three. Come back to the memorized position. You're going to count back to your chest. 5 6 7 8 ending with your left fist back on your center of your chest and your last task is open your hands and put them on your thighs. Do you need me to explain it again? >> At 5 minutes past 8 with the last light gone off the water. The officer says the words, "She's under arrest for boating under the influence." On the recording, her disbelief is almost gentle. This was supposed to be a sunset ride, a few beers with friends somewhere behind her. The kind of evening that Phils feeds every weekend of a Florida summer. Now [music] her wrists are being cuffed on the deck of a patrol boat. And here is the legal reality that makes the moment bigger than one influencer's bad night. Florida draws no line between her jet ski and a 40ft cruiser. A personal watercraft is a vessel. Its operator is an operator. And the threshold is the same 08 that governs every driver on I95 off. >> Okay. Do you have anybody that can come pick up the jet ski? >> Sit down for me. >> Huh? Sit down for me. >> I think so. >> You think so? >> I said how so? >> Do you have anybody that can come pick up the jet ski? >> On a boat. >> On a boat. by land. We're going to be right here so they can come by land and get it. >> Is there anybody? >> No. Nobody under the influence. >> Okay. How are you influ? So the task that we just performed. Okay. Ma'am, you didn't you showed clues enough clues to show that your normal faculties are impaired. It might be you only drank two or three drinks, but maybe with a combination of your med or with your medicine, whatever it may be, but your normal faculties are impaired now. Okay. Um >> the machine weighs a few hundred lb and feels like a toy. The statute reads it exactly like a car and the consequences travel like a cars, too. A BUI arrest means a night in county jail, a court date, potential fines, and probation, and a record [music] that follows her back onto dry land. Nothing about the water washes any of it away. The handcuffs on that deck click exactly like the ones on a highway shoulder, [music] and the booking photo comes out the same. Booked and processed, she made one more decision that shapes everything about how her case reads today. She refused the alcohol test. No breath sample, no blood draw, no number ever. >> Write that number down for me real quick. All right. So, that's So, we're going to try to contact him uh to get the boat towed or get to get it a thing. If not, then we got to tow it. >> All right. I'm going to take him. Uh, you want to come get your stuff for my truck and I guess Woody will take you back to uh to the to the thing. So, go ahead, ma'am. Stand up for me. Okay. Take a step right here. Take a next step over there. There you go. All right. Uh, she got her wallet. >> Yeah. >> Uh, yeah. Let me get the life jacket off. All right. We're going to take this life jacket off you. Do you have a shirt on there? >> No. >> No. Okay. I'm going to take this one handcuff off. You're going to get put this through the life jacket and back out. Okay. Put this one through the life jacket and back out. All right. This >> You got me her light her wallet, right? >> Yeah. >> Okay. All right. There nothing else on there? >> Okay. Inventory. Yeah. Okay. >> Well, well, call that number. The the guy's name's >> So, call that number. Try to get it. >> Some writers imagine that as a trap door out of a BUI. Florida law disagrees. Operating a vessel on state water carries implied consent. the built-in agreement that a lawfully arrested boater will submit to testing and refusing triggers a civil penalty of $500 while a second refusal in a lifetime graduates into its own separate misdemeanor. More than that, prosecutors are free to tell a jury about the refusal and argue what it suggests. So, the missing number cuts both ways. It denies the state a hard figure. It also means her level that night will never be known. Not to a court and not to us. Which is exactly why this video will not guess at one. What the footage shows is the tests and the officer's conclusions. The rest stayed unmeasured by her choice at $500. Notice what [music] this video hasn't told you. Her name. That's deliberate and it's worth explaining because it's the opposite of how this clip usually travels. The uploads that carried this footage sold her as the Instagram model. A label chosen to make you click, [music] not to inform you. But she was never publicly named in the coverage. She holds no public office. And a bad evening on a jet ski doesn't convert a private person into a public figure. So she stays unnamed here and her feed stays unopened. The influencer part matters only for one honest observation. One, two, three. All right. >> I'm good. >> Colbert's off. >> Social media has built an entire aesthetic around golden hour water content. The late ride, the drink in frame, the sunset behind the handlebars, and that aesthetic points people almost by design toward the exact hour and the exact condition the law forbids. [music] The prettiest time to film a jet ski is the most illegal time to ride one. That collision, not one woman's identity, is the story. Where did her case land? Here's the honest answer. The charge on the record was boating under the influence. The refusal carried its civil penalty, and the final disposition is something we have not verified against a court file, so it will not be invented here. She remains presumed innocent unless a court has ruled otherwise, and that principle doesn't bend for view [music] counts. First offense, BUI in Florida generally runs the familiar route. fines, probation, boater education, sometimes a short jail exposure. But which of those, if any, reached her, belongs to the clerk's office? Not to our imagination. What stands beyond argument is the procedural record the body cam preserved, a textbook after dark stop, a by the book transfer and seated battery, and a refusal with its price tag. the entire anatomy of a water DUI captured start to finish in under an hour of Florida evening. So carry two rules off this water because they're cheap to learn here and expensive to learn on a patrol deck. First, the jet ski curfew is real. Half an hour after sunset, the ride is over. Not because the state hates fun, but because a dark ocean full of hulls can't see you, and physics doesn't issue warnings. Second, every throttle is a throttle. The law that met this rider at dusk is the same one waiting at every sandbar, every raft up, every rental dock in Florida, same limit as the highway, same handcuffs, same county [music] jail. If the afternoon involved drinking, the evening shouldn't involve driving anything on asphalt or on water. One more habit worth stealing from this footage. If the plan is drinks on the water, make the [music] plan before the cooler opens. Who rides? Who doesn't? And when the machines get tied up for the night, a jet ski has no designated back seat. There is no sober passenger option, no ride share pulling up to a sandbar. The only version of getting home safe is deciding early that the throttle belongs to someone dry. She learned all of this in front of a body camera, unnamed but recorded forever. You just learned it for free. Ride sober, ride in daylight, and we'll see you on the next