Listen to this articleDear 3 minutesThe audio version of this article is generated using AI-based technology. Pronunciation errors may occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve results. Camp Mystic faces a criminal investigation that could include charges of involuntary manslaughter or negligent homicide in the deaths of 27 girls amid devastating flooding in Texas last year, court documents show. In search warrant requests executed last week, investigators sought to obtain the electronic communications of the camp owners, saying they could provide evidence of involuntary manslaughter, negligent homicide, child abandonment or other crimes. No charges have been filed and a representative for the camp did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment. Brant Johnston of the Texas Rangers wrote in an affidavit that Camp Mystic had inadequate emergency plans, did not conduct emergency drills or training and did not have enough adult counselors in some cabins. Their owners failed to take precautions in relocating children from low-lying cabins despite monitoring nightly flood warnings, Johnston wrote. “Young campers cannot reasonably be expected to independently recognize a rapidly developing life-threatening hazard or to organize and execute an evacuation without the direction of an adequate number of adult supervisors,” Johnston wrote. It concluded: “Camp Mystic, LLC was knowingly and knowingly disregarded a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death to campers in its care.”WATCH | Why the Texas camp was so vulnerable: Texas flash flood: Why Camp Mystic was so vulnerable Several campers and staff died when a flash flood hit a girls’ summer camp along the Guadalupe River in central Texas. CBC’s Eli Glaser examines how the location and design of Camp Mystic may have contributed to the devastation. Twenty-five campers and two teen counselors at the Christian girls’ camp died when the raging Guadalupe River burst its banks before dawn on July 4, 2025. Camp Mystic owner Richard Eastland also died in the flood. For decades, Camp Mystic was a summer staple and institution for generations of families, who left their girls at sleepover camp to ride horses, canoe, fish and attend Bible studies. The camp did not reopen this year and filed for bankruptcy. In total, the destructive flood killed at least 136 people along a several-kilometre stretch of the river, raising questions about how things went so horribly wrong. A sheriff’s deputy pauses as he combs the banks of the Guadalupe River near Camp Mystic, Saturday, July 5, 2025. (Julio Cortez/The Associated Press) Lawyers for some of the victims’ families welcomed the search warrants, but said they should not have been necessary. “For more than a year, the families of the 27 Angels murdered at Camp Mystic have fought, pleaded and pleaded with the Eastland family for accountability and answers,” Christina Yarnell and Brad Beckworth, attorneys for the family of victim Cile Steward, said in a written statement. “Instead, the Eastlands have held hostage the information and answers owed to parents who deserve, more than anyone, to know the details surrounding their daughters’ final moments.” Steward’s body has not yet been found. Johnston wrote in the warrant that he made several visits to Camp Mystic and that he and other investigators conducted interviews with witnesses, flood victims and people associated with the camp. But several people, including members of the Eastland family and other top camp officials, declined to give interviews, Johnston wrote. However, the Eastland family and other camp leaders have testified in court and before the state legislature in the months since the flood, and camp director Edward Eastland offered a tearful apology.
