A Bridgeview Summer Camp Drowning and a Record $21.5 Million Verdict

In the summer of 2014, a six-year-old boy attended a Justice Park District day camp called "Fun in the Sun." On the day he died, the campers were taken to a public pool operated by the Bridgeview Park District at 8100 South Beloit Avenue. The boy did not know how to swim. He was supposed to stay in the shallow wading pool, but he made his way into the main pool instead. He was found unresponsive in the water, roughly ten feet from the edge, with no flotation device.

Counselors were stationed around the pool, and several were within a short distance of where the boy went under. None of them saw him enter the water or noticed him struggling. Evidence later showed that some of the staff who were supposed to be watching the children had gone into a locker room. By the time anyone realized the boy was missing, he had already drowned.

The boy's family hired Clifford Law Offices, where partner Bradley Cosgrove tried the case with associates Charles Haskins and Tracy Brammeier. The estate sued both park districts for willful and wanton misconduct, arguing that they allowed a child who could not swim into the water without supervision or flotation and that neither district had an adequate safety program for the camp. Surveillance video from the pool was a central piece of the proof, showing counselors away from their posts while the children were in and around the water.

Before the case reached the jury, the Bridgeview Park District settled for $3 million. On December 4, 2018, a Cook County jury returned a verdict of $21.5 million. It assigned 80 percent of the fault to the Justice Park District and 20 percent to the Bridgeview Park District. After the settlement was credited, the judgment against the Justice Park District stood at $18.5 million. At the time, the $21.5 million verdict was reported to be the largest ever awarded in Illinois for the drowning death of a child.

The Justice Park District appealed. On September 3, 2020, a three-judge panel of the Illinois Appellate Court, First District, unanimously affirmed the verdict and rejected the district's request to reduce it. The panel wrote that it could not say the award "was the result of prejudice or passion, shocks the conscience, or lacks support in the evidence." The $18.5 million judgment against the district stood.