The families of six campers and two counselors who died in the July floods at Camp Mystic in Hunt, west of Kerrville, filed two separate lawsuits suing the the camp and members of the family who own it for negligence and wrongful death.
The lawsuits, filed Monday in Travis County, allege that camp management knew of the flooding dangers and neglected to inform parents of those risks, claiming the deaths of 25 campers and two counselors were preventable.
“There is no greater trust than when a parent entrusts the care of their child to another,” the petition on behalf of the family of 8-year-old Lulu Peck states. “Camp Mystic and the people who ran it betrayed that trust. Camp Mystic’s shocking betrayal of that trust caused the horrific, tragic and needless deaths of twenty-seven innocent young girls, including Eloise ‘Lulu’ Peck. This case seeks accountability for that betrayal and to send a message to other camps – protect the kids in your care.”
The Peck lawsuit names camp owners Dick and Tweety Eastland, Camp Mystic, Mystic Camps Family Partnership, Mystic Camps Management and Natural Fountains Properties as defendants. Britt Eastland, Dick Eastland’s son, is named in the lawsuit as the Eastland family’s representative; the elder Eastland died in the flooding. The multifamily lawsuit names the same defendants, with the addition of Eastland’s other son, Edward, and his wife Mary Liz.
The multifamily lawsuit comes from the families of Anna Margaret Bellows, Lila Bonner, Chloe Childress, Molly DeWitt, Katherine Ferruzzo, Lainey Landry and Blakely McCrory, who died at Camp Mystic. Childress and Ferruzzo were counselors, while the others were campers.
“Today, campers Margaret, Lila, Molly, Lainey, and Blakely should be third graders, and counselors Chloe and Katherine should be freshmen at the University of Texas. They all are gone,” the lawsuit states.
Mystic, which has been in the Eastland family since 1939, has a history of flooding. The Peck lawsuit outlines three incidents within the last century in which floodwaters prompted evacuations, damaged buildings or swept away personal items and vehicles belonging to Mystic campers and staff.
Both lawsuits claim Mystic knew about these issues but still leveraged appeals to FEMA to have the 100-year flood designation removed from some of the buildings at the camp. The Peck lawsuit claims that FEMA amended flood maps in 2013, 2019 and 2020, removing camp-owned structures along the Guadalupe River and Cypress Lake from the designated flood zone.
“Camp Mystic’s requests to amend the FEMA map were an attempt to hide this safety risk from the public including the campers and their parents, avoid the requirement to carry flood insurance, lower the camp’s insurance premiums, and pave the way for expanding structures under less costly regulations,” the Peck lawsuit states, alleging the Eastland family and Camp Mystic management put profits over the lives of campers.
The multifamily lawsuit alleges that the Eastland family “changed the structure of the camp’s ownership with the goal of protecting the family’s land while still distributing large sums of money to themselves.” The companies named in the lawsuit (Camp Mystic, LLC and Natural Fountains Properties, Inc.) were part of a “web of corporate entities” to separate camp ownership from land ownership, the lawsuit states. The Eastlands also maintained control over cabin location and camp layout, according to the document.
The Peck lawsuit alleges that minority shareholders testified in a previous legal dispute that some areas of the camp weren’t suitable for recreation because “it floods.” Those shareholders were members of the Eastland family, the lawsuit claims.
There’s more, it’s a gift link, read the rest. I still have a hard time reading about what happened at Camp Mystic without getting emotional. I can only imagine how wrenching all this must be for the families. These lawsuits join the two others that have been filed against an RV park in Kerrville. We’re going to be living with this for a long time. Whatever happens with the litigation, I hope everyone who was affected is able to find peace. There’s lots more, from CNN, ABC News, the NYT, the Statesman, the Associated Press, and the Trib.