Boy of 6 wins right to sue dive firm over father’s death
THE young son of a scuba diver who was killed while exploring off the Scottish coast has won a fight to sue the company behind the expedition.
Lex Warner, 50, died after suffering medical complications in the water on a diving trip off Cape Wrath in August 2012 with a group of divers calling themselves ‘Dark Star’.
Mr Warner’s widow Debbie alleges that her husband’s death was due to the ‘fault and negligence’ of the Orkney-based owner of the boat, Scapa Flow Charters.
She claims a fall on deck before the dive caused his death, but her bid to sue missed the legal deadline for taking her action to court.
But yesterday judges at the UK Supreme Court in London said Mr Warner’s six-year-old son Vincent, who was nine months old at the time, could sue the company on his mother’s behalf.
Speaking to the Mail following the judgment, Mrs Warner, 47, of Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, said: ‘Obviously this is a massive relief. But at the same time I’m disappointed that it has taken six years to get here.
‘Hopefully now that my husband’s case can go to court, there will be a full investigation.
‘That’s something that should have happened already and hopefully all the outstanding questions are answered.
‘My case should have been appealed but it never was. And yet it was within the three-year time limit. The action was raised with solicitors from day one. It’s down to professional negligence that everything came to be.
‘It’s a disgrace. I’m on my own with a six-year-old child and I’ve had to do all this myself.’
Mr Warner had fallen and suffered internal injuries while wearing scuba gear on board a chartered boat before the dive.
Despite the fall, diving instructors gave him the all-clear to continue and he proceeded to dive to almost 290ft.
He then experienced medical complications and although Andrew Cuthbertson, skipper of the Jean Elaine, hauled him to the surface, Mr Warner was pronounced dead soon afterwards.
At the time, Mrs Warner claimed she was told her husband had drowned and his fall was not mentioned.
Mrs Warner had just informed her husband that she was pregnant with their second child, who she lost in a miscarriage a few weeks later.
She added: ‘This judgment means I can finally look at square one, something I’ve been trying to do for six years, most of my son’s life.’
Scapa Flow Charters could not be reached for comment.