A lawsuit claims poor visibility, inadequate training, and supervision led to a 12-year-old’s drowning during a scuba certification dive at a North Texas lake.
DALLAS, Texas — The parents of a 12-year-old girl who drowned during a scuba certification training dive in North Texas have filed a sweeping wrongful death lawsuit against multiple dive shops, instructors, and two of the world’s largest scuba certification organizations.
Heather and Mitchell Harrison filed the 40-page lawsuit Friday in Dallas County district court, individually and as representatives of their daughter’s estate, alleging their child’s death was “senseless and entirely preventable” and caused by “systemic safety failures that have plagued the scuba diving industry for years.
According to the petition, the child drowned on August 16, 2025, during an open-water scuba certification training dive at The Scuba Ranch in Terrell while participating in an entry-level course developed by the National Association of Underwater Instructors (NAUI) and conducted by Scubatoys Enterprises, a Carrollton-based dive shop.
The suit names as defendants:
- Scubatoys Enterprises, LLC
- Scuba Ranch and Recreation Parks, LLC (doing business as The Scuba Ranch)
- PADI Americas, Inc. and PADI Worldwide Corporation
- NAUI Services Group, Inc. and National Association of Underwater Instructors, Inc.
- Scuba Knauer, LLC
- Instructors and staff: Jonathan Roussel, Gregory Knauer, Joseph Johnson, and William Armstrong
“We are heartbroken by the recent tragic loss of a young life at our lake this past August. Our deepest sympathy and prayers are with her family and friends, during this unimaginably difficult time,” The Scuba Ranch said in a public statement shared in October 2025.
Allegations of inadequate training before lake dive
The lawsuit states that the girl, who weighed about 77 pounds and stood under 4 feet 10 inches tall, began private certification training at Scubatoys on August 14, 2025, receiving roughly six hours of instruction, including about three hours in a pool.
Plaintiffs allege NAUI standards require at least 10 hours of confined-water training before a student can advance to open-water dives, but say the family was never told that requirement, and their daughter was improperly cleared to move forward.
The petition also claims the child was not provided with, or trained to use, a timing device, depth gauge, or dive computer, tools the lawsuit describes as essential for knowing depth and ascending safely if separated from an instructor.
Poor visibility, a large group, and separation underwater
On the morning of August 16, 2025, the child arrived at The Scuba Ranch around 8 a.m. for open-water training, according to the suit.
Although her parents say they paid for private instruction, the lawsuit alleges she was placed into a group with seven other students of mixed ages and experience levels, supervised by one instructor and one divemaster.
The family says they were told their daughter would be buddied with divemaster Jonathan Roussel, who allegedly told the father, “I will not take my eyes off your daughter.”
Multiple witnesses described underwater visibility that day as between two and four feet, the lawsuit states.
During a later descent, the petition says the child became separated from the group, and the separation was not immediately recognized.
At approximately 10:27 a.m., emergency services were called.
The girl was found underwater about 30 minutes after she was last seen alive, at a depth of approximately 45 feet, below colder, darker water, and about 30 feet away from the nearest training platform.
She was unresponsive, with her regulator out of her mouth, mask, and at least one fin off, and her nose bleeding, the lawsuit says.
The cause of death was later determined to be drowning.
Claims against certification agencies
The suit alleges both PADI and NAUI have long known that students under 16 are not suitable candidates for open-water certification under student-to-instructor ratios as high as eight-to-one, but have failed to require automatic reductions when minors are present.
Plaintiffs claim both organizations promulgated and maintained “inadequate and unreasonably dangerous training and safety standards” and failed to adequately vet, monitor, or discipline unsafe instructors and facilities.
Video allegation involving dive shop owner
The lawsuit also references a video from a 2017 Scubatoys staff meeting in which the shop’s owner, Joseph Johnson, allegedly bragged about how many students Scubatoys had killed without consequences and claimed an insurance broker told him the business could “kill two students each year and still be fine.”
Plaintiffs say the video was provided to NAUI leadership in 2017, but no corrective action was taken.
The Kaufman County Sheriff’s Office initially investigated the death but closed its inquiry less than 90 minutes after the child was declared dead, according to the petition.
At the family’s request, the Texas Rangers reopened the investigation in mid-October 2025, and it remains ongoing, the lawsuit states.
What the family is seeking
The Harrisons are seeking more than $1 million in damages, including for mental anguish, loss of companionship, wrongful death, survival damages on behalf of their daughter’s estate, and exemplary (punitive) damages for alleged gross negligence.
WFAA reached out to Scuba Ranch after leaving a message regarding the suit on Monday afternoon.
They responded Monday evenin saying,“We will refer you to the public statement we previously made back in October,:
We are heartbroken by the recent tragic loss of a young life at our lake this past August. Our deepest sympathy and prayers are with her family and friends, during this unimaginably difficult time.
The Scuba Ranch exists to provide a safe and accessible freshwater environment for qualified Dive Instructors to conduct their training. The Scuba Ranch does not employ Dive Instructors, and does not provide, direct, or supervise instruction received. All Dive Instructors are independent of The Scuba Ranch and not affiliated with us other than as a customer. We do require that all instructors using our facilities follow recognized scuba safety standards outlined by their credentialing agency, as well as professional judgment, to train students safely.
Immediately after this event occurred, out of an abundance of caution, we permanently suspended the instructor from teaching at our facility. The dive shop involved was also suspended from training pending the results of this investigation. This step was taken solely to ensure that safety remains the top priority for divers while at The Scuba Ranch.This tragedy has deeply affected the entire dive community, and we will continue to support those impacted as best we can. We, along with all of you, are awaiting the facts and details to be released with complete transparency so that we may learn from what happened.The Scuba Ranch has and continues to be fully cooperating with the ongoing investigation and remains committed to supporting all efforts to understand what happened. We pray this family receives the answers, justice, and closure they deserve, and that all of the dive community would be strengthened through what we learn.