A game warden does not need a reason to stop you. That is the first thing to understand about a BWI, and it is the single biggest difference between a boat and a car. Under Section 31.124 of the Parks and Wildlife Code, an enforcement officer may stop and board any vessel on Texas water to check it for compliance. No reasonable suspicion. No probable cause. No traffic violation. You are out on Clear Lake or Galveston Bay on a Saturday, somebody pulls alongside for a safety check, and forty minutes later you are doing field sobriety tests on a moving deck.
What the State has to prove
Boating while intoxicated is Texas Penal Code Section 49.06, and the offense itself is one sentence: a person commits an offense if the person is intoxicated while operating a watercraft. Intoxicated means what it means in a DWI, either an alcohol concentration of 0.08 or more, or not having the normal use of your mental or physical faculties because of alcohol, a drug, a controlled substance, or some combination.
Watercraft is broader than most people expect. It covers a vessel, one or more water skis, an aquaplane, or another device used to carry a person on water, as long as it is not moving on the current alone.
BWI penalties in Texas
| Offense | Offense level | Maximum fine | Confinement |
| BWI, first offense (§ 49.06(b)) | Class B misdemeanor | Up to $2,000 | 72 hours to 180 days in county jail |
| BWI, second offense (§ 49.09(a)) | Class A misdemeanor | Up to $4,000 | 30 days to 1 year in county jail |
| BWI, third or later offense (§ 49.09(b)) | Third degree felony | Up to $10,000 | 2 to 10 years in prison |
| BWI with a passenger younger than 15 (§ 49.061) | State jail felony | Up to $10,000 | 180 days to 2 years in state jail |
Now the part other sites get wrong. There is no 0.15 enhancement for BWI. Section 49.04 has one for driving. Section 49.06 does not, so a high breath or blood number does not by itself turn a first BWI into a Class A misdemeanor. There is no open container enhancement either. And Texas does not suspend a boating license over a BWI, because Texas does not issue one. What is actually at risk is your driver’s license, through the same ALR process that follows a DWI arrest, and you have 15 days from the notice of suspension to request that hearing. Miss it and the suspension goes through on its own.
Why BWI cases are winnable
The standardized field sobriety tests were validated on people standing on solid, level, non-slippery ground. NHTSA’s own manual says so. A boat deck is none of those things. Add eight hours of sun, wind, glare, dehydration, and the balance disturbance that comes from a day on the water, and you get a person who looks impaired to an officer and is really just cooked. Officers rarely account for any of it in the report.
Jay Cohen is a certified practitioner and instructor of standardized field sobriety testing. When the officer who arrested you gets on the stand and explains why he scored those clues the way he did, he is answering to someone qualified to teach the course he sat through.
The stop is the other place these cases come apart. Section 31.124 lets an officer board to check your safety equipment and your certificate of number. It does not convert a safety check into a blank check, and what happened between the boarding and the arrest is frequently the whole case.
Charged with BWI in Texas?
Call Blass Law at 713-664-4000 for a confidential case evaluation, and do it before the 15 days run. We handle these across Harris, Galveston, Fort Bend, Brazoria and Montgomery counties. If the arrest involved a car rather than a boat, start with our Houston DWI lawyer page instead, and the punishment ranges for every Chapter 49 offense are laid out on our Texas DWI laws and penalties page.
Reviewed by Jay Blass Cohen, founder of Blass Law PLLC, ACS-CHAL Forensic Lawyer-Scientist, certified Drug Recognition Expert, and SFST instructor, serving Houston since 2009. This article is general information, not legal advice for your situation. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.