"Drifting Dan" Carlock wins $1.68 million after being left at sea

[lamont]

It's actually the lawyer's job to educate the jury in these situations....

Heck, if juries were all as well informed about all of us, they would be no need for lawyers.

We should just get rid of juries and let the Internet forums decide cases from now on...

That'll solve all the problems with our legal system...

 

[cruiser]

This sounds like a case of "Pool's open. Let's all jump in and have a good time." Then when there were serious questions to answer, the dive op had to make it up as they went along.

"We question the amount of effort Mr. Carlock made to swim back to the boat. He chose to let the current take him away."

In a strong current, you don't have much control over being swept away. The site had such strong currents that the boat moved to another site, yet the abandoned diver was supposed to be able to swim back to the boat in these same strong currents? In this situation, surfacing some distance from your dive boat is typical. That's why whistles and safety sausages are part of our gear, and why dive boat personnel are supposed to be aware of what's going on in the water around the dive area.

"Despite his absence, a dive master...marked him on the dive roster as present on the boat...Carlock was again marked on the roster as having taken a second dive...It wasn't until more than 3 hours after Carlock had been left behind at the first site that the crew realized he was missing...

Hmm, marked him as "on the boat" TWICE when he wasn't physically there...

Thank goodness for the 15-year old scout who spotted Carlock bobbing in the water. I hope he gets a special badge for this

 

[Leejnd]

I saw this article in the LA Times this morning, and I rushed right over here to ScubaBoard to see what everyone had to say about this. Couldn't believe nobody had posted this yet!

Engineer wins $1.68 million in scuba diving case - latimes.com

If you want more ScubaBoard background on this case, here are some older threads about it:

Original thread: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ac...-diver-incident.html?highlight=daniel+carlock

Update thread: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ac...charter-company.html?highlight=daniel+carlock

"Whatever happened to" thread: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/so...ed-drifting-dan.html?highlight=daniel+carlock

There are a few things in the article that I found disturbing. E.g. the jury reduced his award on the grounds that he was partly responsible because he had been told to surface closer to the boat, in spite of the fact that he was caught in current. And, the defense contended that he should be judged 50% responsible because, as the defense attorney claimed, ""We question the amount of effort Mr. Carlock made to swim back to the boat," he said. "He chose to let the current take him away." HUH? He CHOSE to allow himself to be swept out to sea? Yeah, okay, I guess he had a death wish and WANTED to be abandoned in the middle of the ocean.

Anyway, I'm very curious what everyone has to say about this. I remember the case well, especially about him being saved by boyscouts.

Thoughts? Comments? I haven't gone back to re-read the old threads - I'll do that now.

Editing to add: This was the first post in a thread that I started in the SoCal forum. I started it there, because I know there are many local divers, including friends and dive buddies of mine, who only go to the SoCal forum and wouldn't see the thread in the "Scuba Related Court Cases" forum. I also started it to give us SoCal divers a thread to discuss the case, among those of us who are familiar with the unique dive boat operations, practices and characteristics of our local waters, which may be unfamiliar to divers from other regions. Unfortunately the SB mods decided we weren't entitled to discuss it in our own forum, so they "merged" my thread into this one, making it appear as if my post was in fact post #13 in THIS thread. So I'm adding this paragraph, because otherwise my post looks very odd and misplaced.

I'd also like to state that I strongly disagree with the decision of the mods to merge the threads. Is there a reason we can't discuss this in our own forum?

 

[Peter Guy]

Bill -- they WERE a jury of "his peers" -- at least I'm quite sure of that. I would be VERY shocked to learn there were any Lords or Ladies, let alone Dukes or Duchesses, on the jury!

 

[Eau_Girl]

In a different sub-form, but here's another thread about the case.

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/sc...es/357124-drifting-dan-wins-1-68-million.html

 

[DeputyDan]

Engineer wins $1.68 million in scuba diving case - latimes.com

Didn't really know where to post this!

 

[AXL72]

Congratulations Dan!!!!

I agree with the decission.

I think the dive charter was too lax in taking head counts, accounting for people, and record keeping, but hey, at least they were great in accurately accounting for who paid and who did not. I am assuming they made damn sure (correctly) that they got paid by everyone and that everyone on the boat signed a waiver before shoving off from dock? but is it not true they did not make sure to accurately account for heads before and after each dive? OR did they incorrectly mark him as paid, too? "Bank error in your favor....collect free dive trip"

 

[Leejnd]

I'm deleting this post because, given that my thread was merged with this one, this is a duplicate.

 

[Leejnd]

That is the problem with juries... they don't always have appropriate specialized information about the intricacies of the cases they are expected to rule on. How many time we hear that new divers don't know what they don't know.. sadly the problem is worst in these situations! Clearly a lot of mistakes were made here and he was responsible for a fair percentage of them!

Really? What mistakes were made by the diver? I'd like to know, because I've been following this case for years, and I cannot see one thing the diver did wrong. So, let's hear it: what'd he do wrong?

 

[Scott L]

Hmm, marked him as "on the boat" TWICE when he wasn't physically there...

I doubt that ink was as dry as the other check marks...