A last-minute boat swap: A small decision made after dinner put Mya and Siggy on a fateful journey! The family had arrived at the restaurant in separate boats.
A last-minute boat swap: A small decision made after dinner put Mya and Siggy on a fateful journey!
The family had arrived at the restaurant in separate boats.
As the evening ended, 9-year-old Mya and 7-year-old Sigmund did not return with their parents but instead boarded a boat piloted by Stephen Schneider.
Just a short distance later, both children were thrown into Barnegat Bay.
The moment the two children switched to their grandfather’s boat now stands out as one of the most heart-wrenching points in the case’s timeline.
*******************
The family had arrived at MJ’s Restaurant Bar & Grill in Bayville in two separate boats. Stephen C. Schneider and his wife Laurie came in their 28-foot Tidewater center-console. Their daughter and son-in-law arrived with the two children — 9-year-old Mya Bella Golabek and 7-year-old Sigmund Paul Golabek — in another vessel. After a dinner that lasted about two hours, a simple change in plans altered the return trip. Instead of riding home with their parents, Mya and Sigmund boarded their grandparents’ boat.
A short time later, shortly after 9 p.m. on July 19, 2026, that boat struck an illuminated channel marker on Barnegat Bay. Both children, who were wearing life jackets and seated near the front, were thrown into the water. They were recovered and taken to Community Medical Center in Toms River, where they were pronounced dead.
The moment the children switched boats has become one of the most painful fixed points in the timeline of the case. It was an ordinary family decision made at the end of a meal. It placed the two children on the vessel that Schneider was operating when the collision occurred.
Two Boats, One Dinner
Court documents and police accounts describe a routine summer evening on the water. The Schneiders arrived by boat. The children’s parents arrived by boat with Mya and Sigmund. The group met at the restaurant, shared a meal, and prepared to head home as darkness settled over Barnegat Bay.
At some point after the meal, the children moved from their parents’ boat to their grandparents’ Tidewater. Public reporting has not detailed the exact conversation that produced the change — whether the children asked to ride with their grandparents, whether space or convenience played a role, or whether it was simply a spontaneous family arrangement. What is established is that the switch occurred and that Mya and Sigmund were aboard Schneider’s boat when it left the restaurant area.
Schneider later told investigators he had consumed two Guinness beers and one Miller Lite during the approximately two-hour dinner. A blood sample drawn under warrant in the early hours of the following morning returned a blood alcohol concentration of approximately 0.16 percent, twice the legal limit. Laboratory analysis concluded that his judgment, perception, response time, and coordination were markedly impaired.
The Short Distance That Ended in Tragedy
The collision occurred a short distance from the restaurant area. Schneider estimated his speed at about 20 mph and said he saw the channel marker only at the last second. Authorities have indicated the marker was illuminated. The impact ejected both children into the bay. Schneider and his wife attempted to pull them from the water and began CPR. Emergency responders transported the children to the hospital, where they could not be saved.
Neither Schneider nor his wife was seriously injured. The children had been wearing life jackets, a fact noted in the investigative records. The life jackets did not prevent them from being thrown from the boat or from the fatal outcome that followed.
Why the Swap Stands Out
In the reconstruction of any fatal incident, certain moments acquire particular weight because they represent the last ordinary choice before irreversible events. The decision for Mya and Sigmund to ride with their grandparents is one of those moments. It was not inherently reckless. Grandparents take grandchildren on boats every summer. The significance lies in what followed: the operation of the vessel by a man whose blood alcohol concentration was later measured at 0.16 percent, the collision with the marker, and the deaths of both children.
The swap also fixed the composition of the boat at the time of the crash. The children’s parents were not aboard. Schneider was at the helm. His wife was present. The two grandchildren were seated near the front. That arrangement is now part of the factual record that prosecutors and defense will address.
The Broader Investigative Context
Schneider faces two counts of reckless vessel homicide, operating a vessel under the influence, and reckless operation of a vessel. Prosecutors have pointed to the 0.16 percent BAC as evidence of the degree of impairment under which he operated the boat. Schneider’s account of three beers remains the competing description of his consumption that evening.
The boat-swap decision itself is not charged as a separate act. It is, however, a necessary link in the chain of events. Without the switch, the children would have been on their parents’ boat. With the switch, they were on the vessel that struck the marker. The investigation continues to examine the full sequence: the dinner, the alcohol consumption, the departure, the operation of the boat, and the collision.
Family members who were present at the restaurant — including the children’s parents — are potential sources of information about how and why the children changed boats. Their recollections can help establish the timing of the decision relative to the end of the meal and the departure from the dock.
The Human Weight of an Ordinary Choice
The children’s parents have supported Schneider’s pretrial release, describing him as a loving grandfather. That support underscores the complexity of the case. The same family that lost Mya and Sigmund is also navigating the prosecution of the man who was operating the boat. The boat swap was a decision made inside that family circle. Its consequences have been borne by the same circle.
Public discussion of the case has repeatedly returned to the image of the two children moving from one boat to the other at the end of a family dinner. It is an image of ordinary summer life on the water — grandparents, grandchildren, a short ride home — that ended in the most permanent loss. The ordinariness of the choice is part of what makes it difficult to absorb.
Reconstructing the Final Sequence Ashore
Investigators have worked to establish the order of events after the meal. When did the group leave the table? When were the children transferred to the Tidewater? When did the boat leave the dock? How much time elapsed between the last possible drink and the moment Schneider took the helm with the children aboard?
Restaurant records, staff observations, family recollections, and any available camera footage can help tighten that sequence. The more precisely the timeline of the departure can be fixed, the more clearly the relationship between the dinner, the alcohol, and the collision can be understood.
A Moment That Cannot Be Undone
Mya was 9. Sigmund was 7. They had spent the evening with their parents and grandparents. At the end of the meal they boarded their grandfather’s boat for the trip home. A short distance later both were in the water. Both died.
The decision that placed them on that boat was small in the moment it was made. In the timeline of the case it has become one of the most heart-wrenching fixed points. It marks the last ordinary family arrangement before the collision that ended their lives.
Stephen Schneider has given his account of what he drank that evening. The laboratory has supplied a blood-alcohol figure of approximately 0.16 percent. The investigation continues to examine the full circumstances of the operation of the vessel. Through all of it, the fact that Mya and Sigmund switched boats after dinner remains a simple, devastating detail: a last-minute change in plans that put the two children on the journey that would be their last.
