The family of Dylan Harrison, the 12-year-old who died during a scuba training dive in Texas in August last year, has filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against PADI, NAUI, and the dive operators connected to the course.
According to a report by Dallas-based Fox4 News, Heather and Mitchell Harrison filed the lawsuit alleging that their daughter’s death was preventable, and that systemic safety failures within the recreational scuba industry are partly to blame.
Dylan was taking part in an entry-level training course at the Scuba Ranch training lake in Terrell, Texas, held by Carrollton-based ScubaToys on 16 August 2025. She went missing underwater during a descent to a 5m-deep training platform and was later found dead.
Multiple failures have been reported in the aftermath, including the failure of local police to recover dive computer data – divemaster Jonathan Roussel’s computer was later ‘lost’ – and the poor conduct of instructor William Armstrong in the immediate aftermath of her disappearance.
Armstrong, a NAUI-certified instructor, was said to be sleep-deprived after working a full day in his role as an assistant chief deputy with the Collin County Sheriff’s Office, followed by an overnight shift as a security guard before the course began.
He has since been permanently suspended by NAUI, and has resigned from his position as assistant chief deputy.
The lawsuit names multiple defendants, including PADI Americas, PADI Worldwide, NAUI, ScubaToys and its owner Joe Johnson, the Scuba Ranch and operator Gregory Knauer, plus Armstrong and his divemaster, Jonathan Roussel.
The lawsuit states that Dylan was paired with another 12-year-old student as a buddy and entered the water without confirmation from Armstrong that she was correctly weighted.
Following her disappearance, it also claims that she was likely alive and breathing for several minutes after she was last seen, during which time she was ‘alone, in poor visibility and unable to reach the surface.’
The filing also references a 2017 internal video from ScubaToys, in which the company’s owner, Joe Johnson, is shown making ‘flippant’ remarks about previous diver deaths.
The plaintiffs argue that the video reflects a wider culture of complacency towards safety within the scuba diving industry.
At the time of the Fox4 report’s publication on 2 February, PADI and NAUI had not responded to requests for comment.
