Parents of 8-year-old missing in Texas flooding sue Camp Mystic

The parents of an 8-year-old girl who remains missing and presumed dead from Camp Mystic after catastrophic Texas floodwaters ravaged the area have sued the camp and its owners for negligence.

Cecilia “Cile” Steward was a first-time camper last summer and was to spend a month at Camp Mystic, the all-girls Christian sleepaway camp along the Guadalupe River near Hunt, Texas. On July 4, just five days after being dropped off, Cile was one of 27 campers and counselors killed as the river’s waters tore through the camp.

Her parents, CiCi and Will Steward, are suing the camp, members of the Eastland family that have run it for decades and other owners. A 108-page lawsuit, provided to USA Today by the Stewards’ attorney, claims the Eastlands and Camp Mystic were negligent in the care of their daughter and intentionally inflicted emotional distress. The family is seeking more than $1 million in damages, according to the suit.

Camp Mystic’s director, Richard “Dick” Eastland, also died in the flood, reportedly while trying to save campers.

“Cile was taken from us 7 months ago and while we recognize this lawsuit will not bring her back, we feel compelled to ensure the truth of Camp Mystic’s failures are exposed,” CiCi and Will Steward said in a statement through their attorneys at the Austin-based Nix Patterson law firm.

The Stewards’ suit is the latest filed over the deaths of campers. In November, a group of other families of campers who died also sued for negligence.

Mikal Watts, an attorney representing Camp Mystic, said the camp will demonstrate that the magnitude of the flooding was “unexpected and unforeseeable.”

“We are devastated by the deaths of our campers and counselors, and we continue to pray for God to comfort and support their families in their unfathomable grief,” he said.

“We disagree with the misinformation in the legal filings regarding the actions of Camp Mystic and Dick Eastland, who lost his life as well,” Watts said, adding that the camp remains proud of its legacy and will implement new procedures and technologies aimed at keeping campers and staff safe.

Lawsuit claims camp ignored warnings

Cile was the latest in a long list of her family members to attend Camp Mystic, the lawsuit said. While being dropped off, the last thing she said was, “Mom, don’t worry, I’m going to be okay,” according to the suit.

“Cile is not worried about her safety. She doesn’t know she needs to be,” the suit said.

The cabin Cile stayed in at Camp Mystic, called Twins II, was among the most vulnerable in the area known as the Flats, and housed the youngest campers, the suit said.

The Stewards’ lawsuit, filed Feb. 4, claims that the Eastlands and the camp had plenty of warning that flooding could be catastrophic, and ignored warnings from the National Weather Service. The Eastlands prioritized profit over the safety of the campers, the family said in the suit.

Because of the camp’s prior history of flooding, including a destructive flood in 1932, the Eastlands knew that there was a risk for catastrophe at Mystic, the suit said.

Overnight on July 3 and the early morning of July 4, the suit said the Eastlands received warnings to move to higher ground. They moved property and horses, the suit alleges.

“At 10 p.m. and again at 2 a.m., the Eastlands move their canoes to higher ground. They do not move the campers. Property is protected. Children are not,” the suit said.

It wasn’t until about 3 a.m. that the Eastlands decided to evacuate some of the cabins, the suit claims. As campers evacuate past Twins II, Edward Eastland told counselors to stay put until water gets “so high they couldn’t stay any longer,” according to the suit. He came back around 3:30 and again told them not to leave, saying the water would recede.

“That order was a death sentence,” the lawsuit said.

The ⁠suit said that Cile was killed because of “preventable failures and broken promises,” not because of an unavoidable act of God.

“The Eastlands dismiss the warnings embedded in Camp Mystic’s own history by insisting the July 4 flood was a 1,000-year event, that the last ⁠time a flood like this occurred, Noah had to build an ark. That is not true. But even if it were, both Noah and the Eastlands were warned a flood was coming. The difference is that Noah prepared. The Eastlands did not,” the suit said.