Do not ever say you are a rescue diver

[SlugLife]

You knew my parents?

I didn't know my brother hangs out on Scuba Board.

The juries are the main problem. They are sympathetic to crying families who have lost loved ones and survivors with graphic injury pictures. Even then one is unlikely to get sued if they do not have recoverable assets or significant insurance policies. But a tour operator is only obligated to provide a level of safety that is reasonable for the group they are taking out. The dive op could likely get sued because they are insured and a lawyer could argue that they should have maintained visual contact with the divers as they hit the water. But a customer with a RD cert? Where is the obligation to risk your life, and the lives of anyone who would then need to rescue you, in order to save another diver when you have determined the rescue to be unsafe?

Precisely. A certain recent nearly $1 billion in damages verdict comes to mind, over what looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment to the US Constitution. Even the FBI agent got something like $90-million, and I'm not sure what for.

Will you win a court-case where you're OBVIOUSLY correct? Competing with a crying family that lost a loved-one in court is an uphill battle, even if their suit is completely baseless. And some of these families will sue anyone and everyone, including many people and companies who had literally nothing to do with the event.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I didn't know my brother hangs out on Scuba Board.


Precisely. A certain recent nearly $1 billion in damages verdict comes to mind, over what looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment to the US Constitution. Even the FBI agent got something like $90-million, and I'm not sure what for.

Will you win a court-case where you're OBVIOUSLY correct? Competing with a crying family that lost a loved-one in court is an uphill battle, even if their suit is completely baseless. And some of these families will sue anyone and everyone, including many people and companies who had literally nothing to do with the event.

Those big initial awards often get knocked down in the appeals process.

 

[Blackcrusader]

I didn't know my brother hangs out on Scuba Board.


Precisely. A certain recent nearly $1 billion in damages verdict comes to mind, over what looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment to the US Constitution. Even the FBI agent got something like $90-million, and I'm not sure what for.

Will you win a court-case where you're OBVIOUSLY correct? Competing with a crying family that lost a loved-one in court is an uphill battle, even if their suit is completely baseless. And some of these families will sue anyone and everyone, including many people and companies who had literally nothing to do with the event.

They won't see a dime of that award

 

[Scubagolf]

For a standard case that one party just loses, paying the other party's legal fees seems excessive. I would, however, support this for cases involving frivolous lawsuits.

This is the case in California where, with exceptions involving statutes or contracts, each party bears their own attorney’s fees. However, Civil Code 128.5 permits a trial court to award attorneys fees in frivolous cases. **

In my 40 years as a defense litigator I defended a small number of what were clearly frivolous cases. They always involved plaintiffs representing themselves without an attorney, and all were dismissed early in the process.
________________
** CCP 128.5
“A trial court may order a party, the party's attorney, or both, to pay the reasonable expenses, including attorney's fees, incurred by another party as a result of actions or tactics, made in bad faith, that are frivolous…Frivolous” means totally and completely without merit or for the sole purpose of harassing an opposing party.”

 

[rongoodman]

Precisely. A certain recent nearly $1 billion in damages verdict comes to mind, over what looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment to the US Constitution. Even the FBI agent got something like $90-million, and I'm not sure what for.

You might think it "looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment" but multiple judges and juries have ruled otherwise. The FBI agent in question was found to have been defamed by Jones just as the parents of the victims were when he accused them for years of participating in a hoax. Defamatory speech is not protected by the First Amendment and the bar to proving it is lower if the plaintiffs are not public figures.

 

[boulderjohn]

Precisely. A certain recent nearly $1 billion in damages verdict comes to mind, over what looks like an opinion protected by the very first amendment to the US Constitution.

If you had taken journalism from me, you would have learned that defamation has never been allowed under the constitution. If you knowingly spread false information that harms another individual, you are guilty of defamation. You don't even have to know it is false--if you have any reason to suspect that the information you are spreading is not true and do not take steps to verify it, you are guilty by reason of a reckless disregard for truth.

As such cases go, this one was not even remotely close.

 

[chillyinCanada]

Let's please get this thread back on topic? The conversation has run too far off. Please skuttle the "suing" and "lawsuit" talk.

 

[tursiops]

Let's please get this thread back on topic? The conversation has run too far off. Please skuttle the "suing" and "lawsuit" talk.

But isn't that the point, really? Fear of saying you are a RD because then you might get sued? Solid information on the likelihood of this -- as opposed to scaremongering and hearsay -- would be useful.

in any case, we keep getting told that SB does not fact-check, so when somebody posts something quite wrong about (in this case) suing and past suits, it is we readers who must correct that info for posterity.

 

[Storker]

Of course, you care for your buddy (even in a 3 guys team) but there are limits.

I should never have said that I am a rescue diver. Those folks believe that I would help them protecting their customers. From now on, I am just AOW with a 40 meters clearance.

The first thing they teach you in Rescue class is not to make one fatality into two. IOW, unless you can rescue the distressed person without unacceptable risk, don't. A DM should know that. "I tried, but in my evaluation the risk was too great". As you said, there are limits.

 

[Storker]

Fear of saying you are a RD because then you might get sued?

I took my RD with PADI, one of the most US-American agencies you can find. Even there, they taught us the Good Samaritan clause. Wouldn't a lawsuit against a Good Samaritan be thrown out directly?