Troubling incident in San Pedro

[AWMIII]

Here is what I know:

Gerson Cordon was an employee of Amigo's Jungle Tours. Amigos Jungle tours is operated out of the same office as Amigos Del Mar on their dock. Changa Paz seems to own both businesses. The instructor Marciano Mendez was training the victim. At some point Marciano decided to turn over the confined water training to Gerson who sounds like a DM Candidate. Amigos Del Mar has publically stated that neither Marciano nor Gerson was an employee. They referred to Marciano as an "Independent Diving Instructor". Amigos Del Mar has tried very hard to state that Amigos Jungle Tours is a separate company with no relationship to Amigos Del Mar other than sharing office space. In my opinion, that is somewhat laughable.


According to the victim, she was taken under the dock to practice confined skills with Gerson since Marciano was busy doing something else. The Amigos Del Mar dock is very large and has a large building on it. The sides are sort of fenced in to keep boats and children from going under the dock. There are several places where it is possible to go under though and under the dock. The assault happened under the dock according to the victim. She was so shocked by the assault, that she didn't really know how to react.


PADI kicked Marciano and Amigos Del Mar out before the trial. I have heard that Changa Paz has not had a good relationship with PADI in the past and that maybe some standards were being violated. It is my understanding that PADI did NOT kick ADM out because of the assault, but it was an accumulation of incidents perhaps including the tank explosion that killed Chapin Duran. I have been involved with a student from our LDS outside Philadelphia who was supposed to be checked out by ADM. The student was sent home to get his C card at our LDS. The folder was illegibly signed and the instructor number was not valid. Needless to say PADI was involved in that incident. I am not saying that that contributed to the expulsion, but that is only one funky incident like that and if we saw it then there must be many more like it.

Marciano was likely kicked out because he was not supervising the DM candidate who was training an uncertified diver. I do not know of anything else.


I know that ADM is trying to move past this, but denying any involvement in it is not helping them.

Ambergris Today | Letters To The Editor | Amigos Del Mar Dive Shop Moves Forward

At this point, it looks like the guilty party has been convicted and justice is being served.

 

[Downing]

Given the little bit of information we got on what actually happened, it would appear to me that 5 years is a pretty strong sentence. This suggests to me that there must have been more to it than the few details in those vague descriptions.

There was an awful lot of discussion about the case and its relationship to Amigos Del Mar, PADI, etc. Since then I have read a piece written by Amigos Del Mar giving their version of things and saying that they had nothing to do with the incident in any way. I don't know what to believe. It would be interesting to have details related to that as well.

I'm going to make an educated guess that a five year prison sentence doesn't really equal five years in prison. There is probably some sort of early parole available. Here in Oregon, I once prosecuted a murder case where the defendant, who had by anyone's reckoning a terrible and violent criminal history, served only 30 days of a five year prison sentence before he was released and killed someone shortly thereafter. That's an extreme example, though, but it wouldn't surprise me if this person were to be released long before his sentence is up.

 

[AWMIII]

From what I understand, many won't survive 5 years at Hattieville.

 

[rossandmaureen]

It is interesting that, after asserting that the Dive Instructor did not work for them, you can go to the ADM website and read about their instructors including:


Marciano Mendez
Dive Instructor
Experience: Over 10 years
From the young age of ten I always knew I wanted to be a diver. Amigos del Mar being a small dive shop at the time helped me accomplish my passion and dream. As soon as I got certified I started coming frequently to the dive shop trying to put more dives as I knew that I wanted to be a professional in that industry. By the age of 18 I had gained sufficient knowledge as boat captain and a dive master. Working with Amigos del Mar as a dive master I soon realized that I had to increase my diving education. As the diving industry became superior and diving became safer with Amigos del Mar, I was urged to continue and not look back at the past but face forward and master my skills. By pursuing another certification in diving I was enabled to become a dive instructor. I am now able to facilitate our customer with two of the largest dives in the industries by giving them the choice of taking a SDI or SSI course.

 

[flots am]

"Was everyone qualified by certification and experience to dive to the depth they went on the blue hole dive? That's the issue"

It's really pretty funny that this thread is still running.

If you want to see who wasn't prepared to dive the Blue Hole, see how many people jumped off the boat with one 80' tank. Whatever number you come up with was how many unqualified divers there were.

flots