Woman who died while diving with husband in Caribbean had panic problems, expert says

Expert: Woman who died in BVI trip had panic issue

TORTOLA, British Virgin Islands — A U.S. woman whose husband is accused of killing her during a scuba dive had a history of panicking underwater, a professor testified Friday.

Shelley Tyre referred to her weight belt and buoyancy vest as “panic problems” in her dive log, said Glen Egstrom, a retired kinesiology professor from the University of California, Los Angeles, where he led diving safety research projects.

He said that Tyre, 46, also wrote that she abandoned her dive partner one time and that the person “rightfully” decided not to dive with her again.

Defense attorneys maintain that Tyre’s death was a “tragic accident,” but prosecutors contend that her husband, David Swain, killed her to pursue another woman.

The Rhode Island couple dove together on the last day of their March 1999 trip to the British Virgin Islands.

Swain, 53, testified that they went their separate ways underwater and that he tried to resuscitate her when a friend found Tyre’s body after Swain had already surfaced.

Experts have testified that they believe Swain wrestled Tyre from behind, tore off her mask and shut off her air supply. Her fin was later found embedded in the sand.

A Rhode Island jury found Swain responsible during a 2006 civil trial after Tyre’s parents filed a suit alleging he killed their daughter because he was courting another woman, and because a prenuptual agreement specified he would not receive any money if they divorced.

Swain was later charged with murder and extradited to the British Virgin Islands in 2007. He has been in jail since.

Swain, who has maintained his innocence, acknowledged this week that he spent part of Tyre’s inheritance to court a chiropractor and take a cruise with her. A forensic accountant has estimated the inheritance was worth $630,000.

Swain said he met Mary Basler before his wife died, but that they did not become intimate until after her death. Basler has testified that she ended the fling in late 2000.