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AND if a homicide don't you think society as a whole needs to find the perpetrator in case they want to do it again?
Given that society is so lax with murderers anyway - we let them out of prison all the time (if we send them to prison at all), I don't think it matters much - and given the number of unsolved murders that do not involve water, I don't think that maybe solving a few that do involve water matter much either.

Bottom line - I guess I'm just a pessimist. The way I see it, even if a murderer walks into the police station, pulls a bloody head out of a burlap sack and plops it on the sergeant's desk, and says, "hey, guess what, I did it!" - the odds are very strong they are not going to get what the deserve anyway - so why bother?
 
The way I see it, if it is my time to go, then it's my time to go. Better to go, then to fight it and risk being permanently disabled and just WISH I were dead.

Obviously if it is one's time to go they will go, kind of a redundant statement. If you are talking about 'fate' or anything like that, I don't believe in any of that guff. To each their own really so I am not arguing that your wishes are wrong, but I do dislike that people presume once they are disabled they will wish they were dead, I find that kind of a put down towards disabled people as disability does not equal having a worthless life. My step brother is permanently disabled from a car accident but is still a useful member of society and lives a full life (he is partially paralysed but can scuba dive, for example). He was on life support for a while actually so lucky they kept him on it.
 
I do dislike that people presume once they are disabled they will wish they were dead, I find that kind of a put down towards disabled people as disability does not equal having a worthless life.
I apologize to all those who are hooked up to machines who will never leave the hospital again, until it's time to go to the cemetery. I hope they have a wonderful life. However, I see no point in living that way, and I have no wish to do so.
 
Had an interesting weekend. Long story short. A gentleman in this area decided to commit suicide by jumping off of the breakwall and into 37 degree water at 2:30 in the morning. (Left a note, cameras seen him headed that way, etc. etc. etc.)

My problem began when the LDS contacted us and asked us to do some diving to look for this gentleman. Didn't think much of it, and three of us took a ride to go diving. Got to the marina and the gentlemans brother was there. He was extremely distraught as he'd been there every day for two weeks looking for his brother. He didn't know who to contact for divers, etc. etc. etc. Told him we would do what we could and entered the water. Visability was pretty good (3-4 feet), no weeds, and found the body within 15 minutes of diving. Came back up and called the police.

Here's where the fun begins. Within minutes, numerous cops show up, stringing tape, blocking off roads, notepads out, radios going, blah blah blah. It didn't take long to become absolutely disgusted with the situation. Evidently, the Sheriff's Department dive team claimed that they had Side Scan Sonared the area but the weeds were causing problems in viewing (again, did I say there were NO weeds?). When I asked why they didn't go in to look for the body, I was told that the water temp and conditions were not favorable for diving (???) I was also told that they were just waiting for the body to float up sooner or later. Wish I could say that this was the end of it (because I was fuming by now) but I had to listen to the officers tell the family that showed up "you're going to want to take off because it's going to be at least 4-5 hours before we get this guy out". From then on it went like this... Who has a body bag, don't you have a body bag, where do we find a body bag.... Who's going to go in and get him out, we can't go in and get him out, you can't go in and get him out, how do we get him out.... FINALLY the Sheriff's Department Dive Team shows up and their worry is "is he bouyed?" (Yes he was and we even tied him to the breakwater wall so he would get caught in the surge again). "So all we have to do is follow the line down"?

Now that I've vented... I know that there are good dive teams out there so please don't get me wrong, but if a dive team is this incapable, why don't they allow local divers to join and help them out? I've been told it's because of a federal funding issue. I mean they all have really pretty suits, but they take 45 minutes to get them on! What if there was a child that fell through the ice? They KNEW he was there! They KNEW where he jumped off! Why did they not go in and get him? My only thought is that 1. They didn't want to dive in the conditions or 2. He wasn't important enough to go in for. Either way....

To top it all off, the newspaper praised the dive team for their weeks of searching for this gentleman! Unbelievable! I am not by any means looking for praise, I'm just hoping someone more familiar with these situations can shed some light on this for me.

If you had it to do over, you should have just brought the body up the first time. I know that would go against the grain of common thought on letting "officials in charge do their job" and preserving evidence. BUT,,,you were dealing with idiots. I have been through the same thing. A diver jumped off the dock in 120' feet of water with steel doubles AND 53 pounds of lead weight. He did not have his gas on. He sank to the bottom and and PSD said they were not allowed diving that deep. We went down and brought him up to 60 feet and tied him off to a rope. THEY came down and took pictures of him and then took him up to the surface. Everyone praised the Public Safety Divers.
 
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At one point I was going to join up with the local dive team. After a couple of interviews with these people, I wasn't sure that this was a good idea at all. They were an emergency rescue team, entirely volunteer and not publicly funded (that was changing).

In doing a pool exercise I was noticing a "wild-eyed" look in a couple of their divers before going into the deep end.

In a later recovery the paper mentioned that one diver had barotrauma to an ear, but that, and I quote, "it was ok, he's had it happen several times before."

That sort of closed the door. That group, I found out later, consisted of a bunch of local boys who had a scuba certification and the local fire chief thought that this'd be fun idea.

Not my kind of organization. I decided to sit that one out...
 
Many agencies use side-scan sonar and it is an invaluable tool. I have seen it find bodies that would never have been located without it. But often time side-scan sonar is no better than the operator who must interpret the images. It is still easy to miss a body with side-scan.

I am glad you guys were able to find the body and help wrap up this case. Believe me when I say the local cops are just as happy. They could care less whether they found him or he was found by a fisherman or beachcomber or you guys. They just want to close the case. But remember, just because you made it look easy does not mean the police did not do their job. There is an old saying that even a blind squirrel can find an acorn once in a while...

I've been a cop since 1980 and have investigated about every crime in the books. I have been stabbed and shot, hit by cars, been in a hundred fights and watched more sunrises come up than you can count, and worked hundreds of my days off to solve a crime that needed solving (without being paid) and have never ceased to be amazed to hear the average citizen airmchair quarterback tell me how simple it is to do this job. Yeah, I make mistakes all the time and sometimes if I don't want to risk a diver's life to find a body I will make the decision to stop dive operations. I will also stop dive ops after a certain period of time depending on the circumstances and the efficient user of manpower. Especially without a last seen point or knowing with certainty that a death occurred. Most victims I have had to look for in the water are not murder victims, for what it is worth. I am sure folks second guess my decisions all the time. But the officers I work with like the way I do my job and that is what really matters to me. I could care less what others think as there will always be those who disagree with me.
 
Thanks for the responses. I get it now. While I was placing the blame on the divers, maybe I should be looking higher. All in all it comes down to a system that is terribly inept. I know the divers in this area are mostly open water trained. They provide ice water rescue, yet are not rescue trained nor ice diving trained. The 911 dispatchers are unaware of who is actually on the dive team so has to call around to find the team members. The list just continues on..

While I may be coming across as bashing PS divers, that's not the case at all. I commend each and every one of you who this job. It is not something I would want to do on a regular basis. But I cannot help but be frustrated with what happened here. It really doesn't have anything to do with the paper recognizing them. It really has nothing to do with the dive team stepping in and taking over. I understand the "crime scene" investigation. What I don't understand is leaving a body there. In one of these posts, it was stated that your job is not only to find what is there, but to find what is NOT there also. Maybe I'm putting too much of the human factor into a police matter, but I still can't help but wonder if he hadn't just been a bartender how this would have played out....
 
I guess I'm just a pessimist.

I"LL SAY!!! Holy crap, man!!!!

I've been in fire/ems for over 16yrs and have seen allot of bad stuff first hand and I don't have near the negative outlook that you do. What gives?

FWIW I've put "breathing tubes" in hundereds of people, done more CPR than I can count and all the "advanced care" that goes along with it. To be perfectly honest I don't believe there are any that are severely brain damaged living on life support so to speak. The reality is most either die or recover, rarely do they remain debilatative for an extended period - I'm not sure that your fears are based on facts.
Hollywood does seem to paint a bleak picture at times though
 
I"LL SAY!!! Holy crap, man!!!!...What gives?
Eh - just read the news I guess.

FWIW I've put "breathing tubes" in hundereds of people, done more CPR than I can count and all the "advanced care" that goes along with it. To be perfectly honest I don't believe there are any that are severely brain damaged living on life support so to speak. The reality is most either die or recover, rarely do they remain debilatative for an extended period - I'm not sure that your fears are based on facts.
I understand what you're saying. I even agree with it. It might be the 1 guy in a 100 who gets CPR and ends up brain damaged. Seems like pretty good odds, a pretty good risk - until it happens to you. Then the risk doesn't seem so worthwhile after all.
 
I just had to chime in on this one. I am sure this will upset lots of PSDs. But... I had an experience almost the same as Dokie. Three years ago the family of a missing youth contacted our local shop for help. It was a boating accident and they felt the Sheriffs Dept was not doing enough to locate the boy. A group of very experienced divers were gathered, all of which dive in cold, dark, no vis, deep-100ft+ water for fun! Our group dove for three nites, only after the Sheriffs were out of the water. lots of red tape. Over the first couple of days I know of at least one out of air situation and three other divers taken to the hospital, all Sheriffs divers! And we found another Sheriffs dive light on the botton, still on. On the third nite with the help of State Police side scan we were put down on a possible hit. The undersheriff instructed us if we were to find the body to go ahead and retrieve it. We did find it and retrieve it in a matter of 20 mins. It was not, I am sure, done the correct way. But there was closure for the family, which is why we were there. P.S. The local paper also gave all the credit to the sheriffs dept!
So my question is, Why not train civilians that are more compitent to do the job! Let them train with the dept and take advantage of the knowlege and experience out there! Why not change!
I do respect ALL PSDs, Kudos to all of you!
 
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