Watson Murder Case - Discussion

[Divedoggie]

I went back through K_Girl's Issues, Statement, and Sources thread, and re-read the verbatim statements that Watson made. I have to say that most of the statements are incoherent babbling. Ayisha, you keep going back to Watson's statements as the source for self incrimination and I honestly can't pull definitive answers out of his ramblings.

Its all uh, you know uh, like the current, uh they didn't ask us, uh you know, the briefing, uh uh kinda like this.

Do people actually think that he had the clarity of mind to plan this months in advance? No way.(IMO)

 

[bowlofpetunias]

Do you really believe that Gabe knew his wife could not handle the dive or that he could not help if she got into trouble. I suspect Gabe's lack of experience and also his personality adversely affected his judgement.

Like many others in this country, I believe that Gabe had a moral responsibility as a husband to ensure Tina's safety. The difficulty is how that works out in a legal setting and applies to buddies not related. For example if Gabe and his mate with similar experience to Tina went for a dive at the same location and his mate drowned, what would be the court decision? The sentence for one becomes a precedent for the other.

My perception is that the sentence in the end was largely made pragmatically to placate the public. That is a concern for the diving community because ultimately if the risk of prosecution gets high and penalties too severe, people will avoid diving, avoid diving with a buddy or avoid getting involved in rescues and instead learn clever legal loopholes.

The fact that Gabe was at least close to Tina and apparently tried to help counts for something. Does everyone on this thread always stay within a few metres of their buddy in case they run out of air? When was the last time you ran out of air or had to give someone your alternative air supply?

The distance I am from my buddy depends on a number of things, vizability, depth, current, familiarity with the site, dive time. I know some will see this as careless but. Beginning of a dive with lots of air, familiar site and easy ability to surface if needed my buddy and I have more distance between us. I know what my buddy's fill is, I know what air consumption is compared to mine, I know comfort levels as the dive progresses and more air is used we tighten up. We may spread out more again as we get close to the exit where we can surface if needed. We know how to read each other all of those factors determine distance. Neither of us has ever run out of air neither of us has ever had to hand our occy off to someone needing air. We have close on 1,500 bottom hours between us. When we do boat dives, dive in unfamiliar sites, high risk sites or with buddies unknown to us we stay pretty tight.

she was certified in a local quarry. per certification agencies, they consider that acceptable for open water dives.


(doesn't mean a diver is skilled enough for boat dives, in current, etc.... but it's just the way that it is now days with cert agencies).




you above comment of "she hadn't been in open water" wasn't what they said either.

Here is the quote from the article, they did refer to the ocean.

"Were you not aware that she had never been in the ocean in an open water dive?" Bloomston asked.​

Just including all the facts in regards to that statement

It also said she had 11 previous dives. Rivers, lakes, quarries, etc. would count towards that.




I've been on a few liveaboards. None of them included an "orientation dive" or a "private" dive breifing (as noted in the article) . All included a dive breifing but it was given as a group to everyone and was mandatory.

Never had a liveaboard do "diver skill checks" before either. (of course rules/laws might be different in Australia). I've seen some divers ask for a DM to dive with them on the first dive on a liveaboard, but that was on request. never seen a boat turn that down either.
​

From this link Michael McFadyen's Scuba Diving Web Site

Tina's dives as recorded by her dive computer were:
11 – Yongala – dive she died on – the previous short dive did not record as she did not go deep enough – 89 feet – 10 minutes
10 – 26 feet – 7.9 m – 33 minutes [the dive with Gabe in the quarry]
9 – 28 feet – 17 minutes
8 – 23 feet – 17 minutes
7 – 30 feet – 11 minutes
6 – 30 feet – 15 minutes
5 – 7 feet – 3 minutes
4 – 7 feet – 3 minutes
3 – 7 feet – 7 minutes

Comment: Note that the computer only retained detailed records of nine dives. I had thought that the dives numbered 3, 4 and 5 may have been test dives done by the manufacturer in a pressure chamber as they are all to 7 feet. However, I now believe that they were the dives that Tina panicked on when training. Her dive training record shows that she did five dives for her course in the quarry (on 7 and 8 June 2003), but as far as I can see, her computer really only shows four dives on two consecutive days which are presumably these days. Therefore, the limit of her dives since her course were to a maximum of 30 feet (9 metres) which is pathetic preparation for diving the Yongala (27 metres). Note her maximum bottom times are mostly less than 17 minutes, with only one of 33 minutes. This indicates that she probably used her air so quick she had to end the dives.
Another interesting thing to note that if this course was done in Australia, it would not have qualified her for a dive certificate as the Australian Standards (AS) at that time required a person to complete four open water dives which must be in an environment which is subject to wind, swell, currents or waves. In no way could the quarry be considered open water under the AS definition. In addition, the dives must be at least 20 minutes in duration (none reached that), all must be deeper than four metres (this was met), two must be to at least 10 to 18 metres (not met), at least one to 15 to 18 metres (not met), one must be a boat dive (not met) and at least 100 minutes in total (not met as she only did 60 minutes or 73 minutes if you include the three 7 feet dives).

It is fairly common practice in a number of places in Australia to have "checkout dives" when you go on Boat dives.... can't say about all Livaboards in Queensland tho. Queensland is normally pretty regulated. When we Dived Lady Elliott Island for instance we had to show them our log books. The dives were guided with a DM and many cases a couple DM's in the water. Divers who hadn't dived in the past specified time frame were taken into the pool for a checkout and skills brush up.

Some are more subtle. Fishrock Dive Centre will check your log book but then they will normally have an Instructor (occassionally a DM) who dives with the people they don't know check them out in the water and depending on how they go.. they will guide them on a dive that is safe for their skill level. I like the way they do it because they will have a DM available to guide the divers in groups so the divers skills dictate what you do but you are not restricted by others who have lesser comfort levels. You don't get the feeling of being "herded" around. The sites can be challenging and the Dive staff know how to read conditions, detect current direction shifts (sometimes they reverse) and give you the best, safest dive experience.

The fact that Mike Ball expiditions expected Tina's C card to mean she had experience she did not (see McFaden's comments) does not IMHO excuse them from ensuring by skill in the water that both she and Gabe were competent for that potentially challenging dive site.

Scuba here is very much self regulated in most of Asutralia. Queensland is probably the most regulated. Regulations regarding fill stations and Cylendar testing are national regulations. The industry here operates on the premise that if we self regulate effectively the government will not need to come in and impose regulation developed by people with poor understanding of the industry. That explains why MIke Ball's busines code of practice exceeded regulations. ONce they establish those Policies and Proceedures they have to abide with them. That is where they failed. That is why they got fined! That is why Austrailian divers are concerned about preseidents set by any dive incident investigation (not just this one)

​

I went back through K_Girl's Issues, Statement, and Sources thread, and re-read the verbatim statements that Watson made. I have to say that most of the statements are incoherent babbling. Ayisha, you keep going back to Watson's statements as the source for self incrimination and I honestly can't pull definitive answers out of his ramblings.

Its all uh, you know uh, like the current, uh they didn't ask us, uh you know, the briefing, uh uh kinda like this.

Do people actually think that he had the clarity of mind to plan this months in advance? No way.(IMO)

I keep seeing the specific number of 16 different stories. I wonder who counted them and what the criteria were to qualify as a "different story?"

One of the links to a video report mentions that Tina's father is positioning himself so the Jury members must pass very close to him that he is maintining this "virgil" in his attempt to "get justice for Tina" The man is dedicated but WOW.. would some find that intimidating? I wonder what would happen if Gabe or his Father took a post like that

 

[Foxfish]

As has been pointed out several times in the distant past, Tina's lungs did NOT have any water in them. She asphyxiated. That forms the whole basis of the prosecution's attempt to understand what happened since everything was ruled out with perfectly working equipment and a reg in her mouth.

Hello Ayisha,

Can you provide your references to back up this statement statement?

As far as I can gather, Tina was said to have died as a result of drowning. I've found no indication in the literature I've reviewed that she was confirmed to have died from asphyxiation.

Under questioning from Crown lawyer John Tate, Professor Williams confirmed water had been found in Tina's lungs, but said it was hard to determine whether oxygen deprivation was the underlying cause, and said he did not have any insight into what caused her drowning. Professor Williams stated that he did not find any medical reason for her death in his post-mortem examination, which also excluded death by natural disease.

Air tank turned off: court | Townsville Bulletin News

From McFadyens website:

The Coroner, David Robert Glasgow, delivered his findings on 20 June 2008 (not 24 April 2008 like the Findings say) , the main ones which were:

Tina Watson drowned


A Post Mortem examination of Tina was carried out by Professor David Williams at the Townsville Hospital at noon on 23 October 2003. The results of the Post Mortem can be summarised as follows:
Tina was 174 cm tall and weighed 63 kg

there were some abrasions on the lower limbs consistent with the rescue

there was evidence of "attended resuscitation"

small amounts of blood stained fluid was visible at each nostril
her internal organs were normal

she had gas in her blood vessels in various parts of the body

no obvious abnormalities in the heart

the lungs showed moderate pulmony oedema (fluid)

radiology showed "florid evidence of air embolism"

a CT scan done later also showed "a large volume of air ... within all intracerebral [brain] arteries"

it also showed air within the arteries in the neck and most other parts of the body

the lungs were quite a bit heavier than would be normal at 630 grams (right) and 520 grams (left)

no alcohol in her blood
some slight traces of drugs such as ibuprofen, diphenhydramine and paracetamol - consistent with painkillers and sea sickness tablets

the evidence of air embolism appeared to be a complication of the rescue - that is when Wade Singleton quickly bought Tina to the surface
Tina drowned
he was unable to say why she drowned

he believed that it was possible she was deprived of oxygen prior to drowning

Pulmonary edema is an accumulation of fluid within the parenchyma and air spaces of the lungs.

I have seen a number of articles that talk about dry and wet drowning and recall some of this from a previous free diving course.

From Wiki:
Water inhalation


If water enters the airways of a conscious victim, the victim will try to cough up the water or swallow it, thus inhaling more water involuntarily. Upon water entering the airways, both conscious and unconscious victims experience laryngospasm, that is the larynx or the vocal cords in the throat constrict and seal the air tube. This prevents water from entering the lungs. Because of this laryngospasm, water enters the stomach in the initial phase of drowning and very little water enters the lungs. Unfortunately, this can interfere with air entering the lungs, too. In most victims, the laryngospasm relaxes some time after unconsciousness and water can enter the lungs causing a "wet drowning". However, about 10-15% of victims maintain this seal until cardiac arrest. This is called "dry drowning", as no water enters the lungs. In forensic pathology, water in the lungs indicates that the victim was still alive at the point of submersion. Absence of water in the lungs may be either a dry drowning or indicates a death before submersion.


Drowning - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


In simple terms, when a person inhales water and starts to drown, there is an involuntary restriciton of the airways normally until they lose complete consciousness and relax. In some cases this restriction does not relax and the person effectively suffocates. In that case it is called dry drowning.

I also believe that she was in the throes of death when Stutz saw her moving slightly and then freefalling lifelessly. I believe that is the prosecution's theory and why she was already dead/almost dead in the short time it took Singleton to get to her.

Glad we could agree - for a change

.

McFadyen's graphs indicate that Tina took about a 1 1/2 minutes to descend to the bottom and was on the bottom for 2 minutes prior to being rescued by Wade. As mentioned before, I'm not sure to what extent these graphs reflect what was recorded on Tina's computer and how much was inferred.


Additionally, I did some research on the topic of drowning on the internet to review both the stages involved in drowning and the time taken. The best I could come up with was a number of articles prepared mostly for surf life saving clubs and on some of the question and answer blogs. Given the variation seen I question their integrity. I couldn't find any reputable medical articles on the topic.
There were big variations in the times reported for a person to drown and I suspect some of that related to how you define drowing and would be affected by the person's age, state of mind, extent of physical exhaustion etc.

These sources typically state that a diver loses consciousness before the on set of a samba. My understanding is that a person can start to lose consciousness ie. be semi conscious, and have a samba while at the same time being convinced they are conscious and appearing conscious to those around. They will even deny losing consciousness after coming around when those around them have clearly observed they became semi conscious.

I'm interested to know if this is discussed at length in the scuba rescue courses as it seems to me important for rescue divers to be aware of these stages See link posted previously on blackout in free diving which discusses this in some detail. I expect that this will be discussed at length in the trial by Dr Edmonds.

For the purposes of discussion here is one table on the stages of drowning. As mentioned, I don't believe this is necessarily accurate. It would be nice to have something like this from a reputable medical source as a basis for further discussion on this topic.

Drowning Stages (Active Victim) ​
Surface struggle	(10 - 20 seconds)
Involuntary breath holding	(30 - 90 seconds)
Unconsciousness	(60 seconds)
Hypoxic convulsions	(5 - 10 seconds)
Aspiration
Clinical death	(3 - 4 minutes)
Biological death	(4 - 6 minutes)

Drowning Recognition

 

[Foxfish]

I went back through K_Girl's Issues, Statement, and Sources thread, and re-read the verbatim statements that Watson made. I have to say that most of the statements are incoherent babbling. Ayisha, you keep going back to Watson's statements as the source for self incrimination and I honestly can't pull definitive answers out of his ramblings.

Its all uh, you know uh, like the current, uh they didn't ask us, uh you know, the briefing, uh uh kinda like this.

Do people actually think that he had the clarity of mind to plan this months in advance? No way.(IMO)

I've listened to some of his testimony and thought he did pretty well. I'd sound a lot like this in similar circumstances. It's okay. I won't take offense.

 

[ThePipingSheriff]

I'm getting in this mighty late, but I read something about her being overweighted. Does anyone know how much weight she had on and whether or not she had an exposure suit on? I also read something about an equipment malfunction. Has the defense ever proven this? What was the depth? There seem to be reports of false truths being stated by the suspect which I don't understand. Last year I took a Stress and Rescue course. If I slept well the night before, was up all night or had just lost my wife I believe if asked if I had taken one my answer would be "yes."

Strange case!

 

[Divedoggie]

Tina's dives as recorded by her dive computer were:
11 – Yongala – dive she died on – the previous short dive did not record as she did not go deep enough – 89 feet – 10 minutes
10 – 26 feet – 7.9 m – 33 minutes [the dive with Gabe in the quarry]
9 – 28 feet – 17 minutes
8 – 23 feet – 17 minutes
7 – 30 feet – 11 minutes
6 – 30 feet – 15 minutes
5 – 7 feet – 3 minutes
4 – 7 feet – 3 minutes
3 – 7 feet – 7 minutes

Only one of those dives would have counted in my book. If this is what the prosecution is using, it is misleading. If Gabe's 50 dives were logged this way, it is misleading.

Based on the depths and times, I would estimate that the first 5 dives are her Confined water training sessions in the swimming pool where she was kneeling at the deep end for a few minutes to observe and then perform skills. The 7 foot depths are consistent with a swimming pool.

Dives 6-9 are consistent with her Open water training dives. Not one over 20 minutes, btw. We make sure Open Water training dives are at least 20 minutes long. Dive 4 is regularly 40 to 50 minutes.

Dive 10 counts. It is the single quarry dive with Gabe. (If he was plotting to kill her, why didn't he just turn her air off then?)
Dive 11 was the 2nd dive as a certified diver, her first in the ocean and her final and fatal dive.

If Gabe's 50 dives reflect swimming pool time, or multiple ascents during a single training dive, they cannot be counted. My gosh, on a typical Open Water training dive with 8 students, I will do 4 Alternate air ascents and 8 CESAs. If I logged each descent and ascent starting with the initial one, I'd have 13 dives logged for each actual dive. As it is, I rarely even log training dives, unless they were remarkable in some way.

 

[ROMO DIVER]

Purely conjecture, but the quarry outside of Birmingham they did the dives in has a platform attached to the dock you enter the water on that is about 7 feet deep. May or may not be the same as logged. Hard to tell without dates.

 

[Valwood1]

You guys are amazing in your ability to use facts to support your position, and I mean that in the kindest way. So tapping into some of that wisdom, can somebody suggest a plausible explanation for why, in the photo of Gabe during his ascent, he is grasping his octo in his right hand? Unless he claimed that he tried to give her his air (which I don't think he did, but check me on that please), why in the world would someone ascend holding their octo? He had plenty of air, as did she. No mention of a malfunctioning primary, and you can clearly see his bubbles from his primary as he exhales in the photo.

So what gives? Can someone who teaches or trains help me understand if this is common to observe in novice divers? (although 55 dives would put him well past that.) Anyone? Thanks in advance.

Aside from Ayisha's correction on the photo, it would not surprise me at all to learn that a panicked diver did about anything during his/her panic, nor would it surprise me to hear that a panicked diver forgot what happened during the dive, or thought things happened that did not happen. In fact, lack of memory about events in a panic situation is common, even if there is a good outcome (i.e., nobody died or was bent), as I learned from a very experienced diver and well-respected board member here who commented on my lack of memory about events during a scary downcurrent "adventure".

Consequently, while I appreciate the frustration of trying to find logical answers and reasons to explain illogical or suspicious or stupid actions, I also recognize that, sometimes, the most logical explanation of such actions is simply, "He panicked".

 

[Foxfish]

Based on the depths and times, I would estimate that the first 5 dives are her Confined water training sessions in the swimming pool where she was kneeling at the deep end for a few minutes to observe and then perform skills. The 7 foot depths are consistent with a swimming pool.

Good thought. Not sure if Tina or Gabe owned their own equipment while doing their OW. I'd imagine that most students would hire their gear.

 

[Divedoggie]

Purely conjecture, but the quarry outside of Birmingham they did the dives in has a platform attached to the dock you enter the water on that is about 7 feet deep. May or may not be the same as logged. Hard to tell without dates.

Is the platform used as a confined water teaching area during summer months? Still, a couple of 3 and a 7 minute venture to 7 feet aren't dives, and are likely training exercises.

As to whether she hired or bought her equipment for the class, I think someone mentioned about 10 pages back, that she bought her equipment for the class. No matter, I think that we all agree that saying she had 10 dives prior to the accident, is a gross exaggeration. Ben's published number of dives is likely a gross exaggeration as well.