3 articles · Updated · The Washington Post · Sep 23
Summary
Fourteen court-approved warrants let Texas Rangers search electronic data from the Eastland family, counselors and staff as they investigate possible manslaughter, negligent homicide and child-abandonment charges over Camp Mystic’s 2025 flood deaths.
Affidavits say camp leaders monitored late-night flood warnings but failed to quickly move girls from low-lying cabins, while inadequate emergency plans, little training and too few adult counselors showed a conscious disregard for known risks.
The probe began in March, and investigator Brant Johnston wrote that several top camp officials—including Edward and Mary Liz Eastland—refused interview attempts; no charges have yet been filed or presented to a grand jury.
Twenty-five campers, two young counselors and owner Richard Eastland died when the Guadalupe River flooded on July 4, 2025; the wider disaster killed at least 137 people.
The Eastlands already face civil lawsuits, the camp stayed closed and later filed for bankruptcy, and victims’ lawyers said the warrants could finally force accountability despite some lawmakers calling the criminal inquiry a witch hunt.