(July 4th, 2013 at 0815hrs)
On july 4th, 2013 i, indiana conservation officer was called out to the residence to investigate a boating incident that occurred the night before.  Owner informed me that someone struck his boat the night before (july 3rd, 2013).  Owner stated that his wife heard a crash sometime between 2200 and 2215 as she was just lying down for the night.  Wife stated that she thought it was a car crash out front and was waiting for the sirens but they never came, so she went to sleep.  I observed significant damage to owner's pier and to his boat (in2655ay).  I observed the propeller had been broken at the drive shaft and was completely missing.  The boat had also been hit hard enough to push it forward off the lift.  I also observed that the pier had two boards that were severed.  It appeared as though the boat that hit boat had been coming into the channel between little barbee lake and big barbee lake with too much speed and hit owner's boat and pier almost directly head on.
I did not observe any paint transfer and also found that the distance between where the boards were damaged and where the propeller would have been was approximately 6'.  This indicates that the suspect boat may have been a pontoon.  Several unnamed witnesses confirmed this.  One witness was an adult male that approached owner at his residence on july 4th, 2013, stating that he saw the incident happen.  According to the witness, after the pontoon struck owner's boat and pier it took off through the channel towards big barbee lake.  The witness stated that he followed them but lost them once they got to the big lake because they shut their lights off.  Owner informed us that this witness saw big “porch lights” on the front of the pontoon.
I was unable to locate the suspect pontoon on this day.
Warsaw