Filmmaker Rob Stewart's family files wrongful death lawsuit

[The Chairman]

Well, we can thank Concannon making a mountain out of a molehill for losing out recovery team...

Key Largo dive team captain says look elsewhere for help | FL Keys News

FWIW, this is an article on the team from February. Key Largo firefighters’ dedication on display during recent high-profile tragedies | FL Keys News

So, Key Largo's Fire Department in a knee jerk reaction to Concannon's aggressive grasping for revenue sources, has lost the VOLUNTEER services of Ron Blesser. That's simply horrible.

If you haven't kept up with this, there was a Fire Department regime change a few years ago. Blesser et al, was a part of that old regime, has FD insignia all over one boat he has had on permanent loan to the department. He's been the curator of several items from the FD which he is now returning as he severs all ties with an ungrateful bunch of jerks.

 

[Wookie]

I think you're wrong. I think you don't want to know what really happened on the boat that day because you made your mind up what really happened and the real story doesn't fit your narrative. I feel bad for Bleser and Dawson and all of the names of friends of mine who were drawn through the mud, but you have had Sotis convicted for months now and maybe, just maybe it wasn't Sotis's fault.

Why wouldn't the investigator ask for Bleser's credentials, he represented (and thought, and the fire department thought) that he was a member of the fire department? And the fire department cut him loose to flop and twitch.

Your anger needs to be directed at the fire department who cut Bleser loose, and not the guy who is trying to get to the bottom of what happened to Stewart.

I have been friends with Rob Bleser for 15 years. He no longer returns my phone calls. It breaks my heart. This lawsuit is the wrong lawsuit, aimed at the wrong people, and it's going to screw everyone in the Keys. And Concannon's investigator, a retired FBI man, went into Key Largo with the attitude that if folks would tell him the truth, all of the focus could be directed to where it really belongs. But the "other attorney" told everyone to shut up, and the whole thing blew up.

But all you have to do is compare the records of the "Other attorney" and Concannon and think for a minute.

 

[The Chairman]

I think you're wrong.

That's what I love about you Frank: your frankness! You never attribute our differences of opinion to anything nefarious.

Unfortunately, Concannon has done just that with the recovery team. I've heard him on the TV interviews questioning the ethics of Jenni being on the recovery team. Really? How's that effin germane to Stewart's death? Where others refused to look, Jenni showed some compassion by jumping in with both fins. He's earned my respect by putting his time where his mouth is. Where the hell was Concannon? Where was Sotis? I'm disappointed that Concannon wants to turn this into an issue. I'm even more disappointed that the captain running the Fire Department reacted by distancing themselves from Blesser et al over Concannon's overly aggressive comments. They even pointed to his demands as a "fiasco". How tragically stupid.

 

[Wookie]

There is nothing nefarious here. You and I have a difference of opinion. I have information that isn't public, which allows me to further refine my opinion. I feel badly that friends of mine are caught in the crossfire of a poorly conceived lawsuit. When the facts are known, I think you will find that bad things happen to good people, and that there were a million ways to have broken the chain of events that led to Rob's untimely death. And that all of the named parties made an attempt to break that chain, but other parties were interested in saving a few bucks. That is what I've been led to believe. This was uncovered as a part of the investigation.

As far as Jenni being on the recovery team. This does not pass the sniff test to me. An investigator that has historically been on the legal team for the insurance company is a recovery diver. A named party in the lawsuit (who had to have been known they would be named) was a recovery diver. Other agencies offered to help but were waved off. In a perfect world, we would say that they just wanted to do what is best for the family to provide closure. We do not live in anything close to a perfect world, and two of the folks with the most to lose handled the body with no oversight. This stinks, Pete, it stinks to high heaven, and you can wrap it in bacon all you want, it still smells of BS. And bacon wrapped BS is still BS. And when that thread is pulled, Rob Bleser got caught in the unraveling.

I do not agree with Concannon's attack on Rob, and he knows I disagree with it. I have made it plain on his facebook page that I think that that attack was completely unwarranted. A man doing what he thought was right, and in the end was effective, is being treated brutally, and if I saw you treated that way I would stand up and back you up too. Oh, wait. I did.

And at the end of the day, if what I have been told is correct, neither named party (I consider AH to be a single entity, even if they aren't) comes even close to being at fault, as there were contracts, e-mails, and warnings of dire consequences that were ignored or discounted. We're in the CYA business, and the named parties were good at it.

 

[Patoux01]

It seems some of the posts on Add Helium's facebook page have been deleted.

 

[oldschoolto]

Remember... Nothing is really "DELETED".. They always find it...

Jim...

 

[Diver0001]

I just got around to reading this thread (or parts of it). I may be one of the few people who had never heard of any of the players involved here until after it happened. I did, however, read the complaint and it seems pretty clear why they are suing and it's not what was said in the article posted by the OP.

The complaint is actually pretty simple. It paints a picture of a dive involving Rob Stewart and Peter Sotis in which Peter Sotis had some kind of trouble immediately post dive. It reads like it distracted everyone who subsequently lost track of the diver who was still in the water. The diver who died was a customer and two companies (I presume the dive op and the operator of the boat) and two individuals are named that had a duty of care to ensure his safety. They were, according the complaint, negligent in not doing their part to ensure the safety of the diver who was still in the water and the allegation is that this is what lead to his death.

As we all know liability works like A leads to B leads to C. There is a duty of care (A), a tort (B) and a damage (C) and there needs to be a causal link between the three (at least in most countries. In the USA you just have to convince a jury of laymen).

The complaint that was filed did not mention any of Sotis' previous legal problems, the fact that he was Stewart's instructor or the fact that Stewart was using rental gear provided by the operator. That last part could be part of it, I guess, if it turns out that the gear was malfunctioning, but the way it stands, it looks like the allegation is just that people forgot about Stewart being in the water due to the problem Sotis was having and literally everyone on the boat and particular the two people who SHOULD have been watching failed to notice that he was having trouble until it was too late.

I don't have a horse in this race but to me it seems unlikely that Peter Sotis will be found liable because he had collapsed onboard the boat and was receiving (I assume) medical attention. Even if he did have a duty of care I don't think a court will find him guilty since he was apparently not in a position to execute it.

It's unclear what role Claudia Sotis was playing or why she didn't have eyes on the diver in the water but I googled them and it turns out she's a doctor. It could be that she was tending to Peter Sotis. If a jury decides that she had a personal duty of care to Rob Stewart as the complaint alleges then I could see a jury hanging her out to dry.... The plaintiff will argue that she literally let someone to whom she owed a personal duty of care die so she could take care of her poor injured husband. That isn't going to easily get the "thumbs up" from a jury of laymen, methinks, and the defense will have its hands full trying to put lipstick on that pig. The big question will be if she really owed Rob Stewart a personal duty of care.

So what it looks like to me from the fragments of information I've been able to find is that there was a breakdown of procedures on board. It would appear that both the crew and the divers from Add Helium were unprepared for an incident involving both divers and not a single person who should have been paying attention had the wherewithal to say, "get that other diver out of the water". That's all it would have taken (probably) to save Stewart's life. To me it looks like the question will be if the operator of the dive or the operator of the boat will be blamed.

All in all my initial impression was to think, "here we go again", but after reading the complaint I can fully understand why they are being sued.

R..

 

[oldschoolto]

They are being sued because some family want to blame someone for their sons death.. nothing more.... How about we start taking responsibility for our life .. He was living the fast track to CCR and the stuff went bad... Man up... Take the hit and say my son is dead because he was in over his head and stupidity killed him..

Jim...

 

[Diver0001]

They are being sued because some family want to blame someone for their sons death.. nothing more.... How about we start taking responsibility for our life .. He was living the fast track to CCR and the stuff went bad... Man up... Take the hit and say my son is dead because he was in over his head and stupidity killed him..

Jim...

Did you read the actual complaint?

He was boat diving and it's not unreasonable to expect either the crew or the dive operator to render surface assistance if needed. The allegation that they ignored him due to being distracted (I presume) and allowed him to fall unconscious and sink back under water without noticing it. This is all the more curious considering that the other diver was also experiencing difficulties. You would think that somewhere along the line the coin would drop and someone would get him out of the water or check to see if he was ok, since his buddy was not..... but they didn't.

The allegation is that someone on that boat had an actual legal requirement to do so (render support to divers on the surface), that they didn't live up to that requirement and that as a direct result of not doing so, he died. That's how liability works. Whether they can connect those dots to a jury's satisfaction remains to be seen but I think they may have a legal point regardless of people's personal sensibilities about taking responsibility for ones own decisions.

When it comes right down to it, falling unconscious for whatever reason isn't a "decision" that a person makes. I'm sure he didn't "plan" for that to happen any more than Peter Scotis, who contrary to Stewart IS an experienced rebreather diver, "planned" to collapse after the dive, possibly from the same cause. So I don't think experience necessarily plays into what happened here. The crew helped Sotis and he lived..... why didn't they help BOTH divers? I think that's an interesting question and I think the family has a right to an answer.

R..

 

[chillyinCanada]

Old-school, does your opinion change in the scenario of a standard dive? As Diver0001 said, all it may have taken was for one person aboard to have eyes in the second diver and do the utmost to get the second diver aboard.

Lets completely set aside dive profiles and gear choice. Yes, we're responsible for ourselves but don't we have the right to believe we'll be brought aboard? Not left out to sea, etc. Etc.

After all, it wasn't an independent shore dive.