lawyers send out peremptory cease and desist

[socaljohn]

While this does not seem to be in court yet, seems the Lawyers are making sure nobody trash talks the dive operators before the facts are in. Seems kinda lame but we live in a litigious society, and lawsuits can go both ways.

Boat passengers get letters from attorney on scuba diving death : News : CarolinaLive.com

 

[theduckguru]

Sirs,

Thank you for your correspondence. Upon your warning, please do not contact me as I am not speaking to anyone about this accident.

 

[Lead_carrier]

Sounds reasonable to me. I know we on Scubaboard have never jumped to any conclusions or badmouthed anyone that we shouldn't have.(sarcasism intended) Maybe WPDE should have gotten a letter also. On the screen they have Mr. Kirk as a Master Diver but in the story they call him a divemaster. I've found a couple of other places that have him listed as a master diver. I can see why Mr. Kirk didn't get one. Apparently he didn't get back to the boat until everything had already taken place so his testimony, for the most part, would be irrevelant.

Here's another story link from the nurse. If things happened the way she states they did, there will be a number of thumps when people start getting thrown under the bus. Tho I seriously doubt anything will ever be allowed to be made public.
Nurse says deadly scuba accident possibly avoidable : News : CarolinaLive.com

 

[Scared Silly]

The letter says "should any investigation determine that the vessel's equipment was in proper working condition and/or that any deficiency was the result of operator error, any public comments to the contrary would be defamatory and Coastal Scuba will pursue all available remedies."

would be defamatory and could be defamatory are very different beasts.


Defame - Any intentional false communication

Thank you for your correspondence. Upon your warning, please do not contact me as I am not speaking to anyone about this accident.

That is exactly what they want and IMHO the wrong line of thinking. It would be better to state:

Thank you for your correspondence. Do not contact me except through my legal council.

 

[DA Aquamaster]

They are gonna need really good lawyers with crew like that:

"Poor young man kind of freaked out," said Sterbenz. "He said it's going to blow, and he threw the oxygen overboard."​

 

[mathauck0814]

The passenger intended to file a complaint because he didn't like the dive briefing? Some people have too much time on their hands.

 

[theduckguru]

Deleted

Sounds reasonable to me. I know we on Scubaboard have never jumped to any conclusions or badmouthed anyone that we shouldn't have. Maybe WPDE should have gotten a letter also. On the screen they have Mr. Kirk as a Master Diver but in the story they call him a divemaster. I've found a couple of other places that have him listed as a master diver. I can see why Mr. Kirk didn't get one. Apparently he didn't get back to the boat until everything had already taken place so his testimony, for the most part, would be irrevelant.

Here's another story link from the nurse. If things happened the way she states they did, there will be a number of thumps when people start getting thrown under the bus. Tho I seriously doubt anything will ever be allowed to be made public.
Nurse says deadly scuba accident possibly avoidable : News : CarolinaLive.com

 

[GrandpaScuba]

While this does not seem to be in court yet, seems the Lawyers are making sure nobody trash talks the dive operators before the facts are in. Seems kinda lame but we live in a litigious society, and lawsuits can go both ways.

Boat passengers get letters from attorney on scuba diving death : News : CarolinaLive.com

This is just lawyers doing what they do best: blow smoke. They hope to shut people up by intimidating them. But they don't have a leg to stand on. No judge has issued a gag order and there is nothing they can do to people who just report what they observed and what they believe happened. They would have to prove that the observer was deliberately lying with the sole intent of doing severe harm to the subject. Very difficult to prove under these circumstances.

 

[t-mac]

Businesses that talk through their lawyers are in trouble. It doesn't claim the equipment was NOT defective! It say if it's not defective. . . Umm. What if it is? Wagers as to how this comes out?

 

[MHBearIt]

I'm new to scuba and new to this board. Please politely correct me if I'm out of line.

If they're going off the schedule, then I dove the same charter on the same site mid-June. It was my fifth charter, so I don't have a lot to compare. But what stood out to me was the safety talk; it was repeated. I didn't see the actual equipment, just pointed to where to find it. In my opinion it was the same as the other charters I had taken. They had set up lines on either side of the boat at 15 feet taking you to the mooring line, then down to the wreck. They had ref lines set up as a tour around anything worth seeing that took you from the mooring line, around the wreck and back.

Looking at my log book, the time would have been somewhere near the beginning of the second dive. The boat doesn't move between dives and both dives are at the same site. You dive, come up for a break (my log shows a 55 min SI) and dive again. I was a single and they buddy'd me up with two other singles. Where were her buddies?

Sterbenz said while they were trying to save Murphy's life on the boat, the divers Murphy had been diving with were still underwater.

Is the rule to look for your separated buddy for a minute and then surface if you can't find them just for us newbies?