The family of a 4-year-old Kentucky girl who drowned in a South Carolina pool has filed a lawsuit against the resort — where two other children have died in three years.
Demi Williams drowned on April 1, 2021 in one of the pools at Crown Reef Beach Resort and Waterpark in Myrtle Beach. Officials said he died of asphyxiation due to drowning, WPDE reported.
The resort had no lifeguards and was poorly lit, according to a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family, who hopes the action will lead to more safety measures to prevent further tragedies, NBC News reported.
“Something has to be done,” Demi’s mother, Destiny Morgan, told the outlet in her first interview since losing her child. “I have to do something in honor of my child to make sure this never happens again.”
Morgan said a nurse detected a faint pulse after Demi was pulled from the pool and other guests rushed to find a defibrillator to revive the girl.
But the lifesaving devices — which can pose a risk of electrocution when used on drowning victims — are not required by state law to be placed in swimming areas and were not accessible to rescuers.
State law does not require the resort to have lifeguards at all of its pools, NBC News reported.
Demi is at least the third child to drown at Crown Reef Beach Resort and Waterpark between 2018 and 2021, including a 5-year-old boy who died a few days after Demi, according to the outlet.
The lawsuit, which seeks damages, accuses the resort of creating “unsafe or defective” conditions by not having a lifeguard on duty and not providing a sufficient number of workers to protect guests, among other things allegations.
He attributes the death to the “negligent, reckless and willful” actions of Crown Reef.
Morgan, who has four other children, described Demi as “the sweetest little girl” who had a great time in the resort’s lazy river, whose gentle current allows guests to go tubing.
She said her daughter asked her if she could ride a raft alone in the 3-foot-deep water.
Morgan said she sat in a nearby hot tub after allowing Demi to ride in her own tube behind her sister. But when the sister got off the ride, she couldn’t find Demi, according to NBC News.
The frantic mom searched the grounds for Demi before noticing another guest pulling her out of one of the resort’s pools, without breathing. Neither she nor her other children know how Demi got there from the lazy river, but Morgan said her daughter may have slipped and fallen in.
Several guests began chest compressions, including the nurse who detected a weak pulse and yelled for an automated external defibrillator, or AED, which delivers an electric shock to the heart.
But no one could find an AED, a lifeguard or even a resort staff member, according to the lawsuit.
“There was no indication that they cared about human life,” Morgan told NBC News.
Demi was rushed to the hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
State law does not require the resort to have lifeguards in its pools or lazy river, the newspaper reported, citing the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control.
Only water slides must be supervised, while other water areas must have signs indicating that there is no lifeguard on duty, NBC News reported.
When it was last inspected in July 2023, all of the resort’s pools were found to have the appropriate signs indicating that there were no lifeguards, according to the outlet.
The appropriate signs were also reportedly present during inspections in 2021 and in 2018, when 7-year-old Malazya Fayall drowned in one of its pools.
Morgan and his attorneys, Justin Lovely and Amy Lawrence, want their lawsuit to result in security improvements at the station.
“More lifeguards, better lighting, more staff: These are simple solutions that could solve this problem,” Lovely told NBC News. “Close the pool at night if you don’t want to have someone there during the shift.”
Malazya’s mother, Latoya Fayall, sued the resort in 2020 and settled the issue last after blaming the death on an overcrowded pool, with no lifeguards or cameras monitoring the area.
Crown Reef did not admit responsibility for Malazya’s death, instead blaming Fayall, but confirmed there was no rescuer and said there were “numerous signs that he did not “There were no lifeguards on duty in the pool area,” according to NBC News.
Morgan was initially arrested for unlawful child neglect, even though she had not drunk alcohol or left her children alone, her attorneys said.
The charge was dismissed last month.
Fayall was also initially charged before being dropped, NBC News reported.
Crown Reef’s attorney and general manager did not respond to multiple requests for comment from NBC News.
In another recent case, 8-year-old Aliyah Jaico was sucked into a pipe in a “lazy river style” pool at the Houston DoubleTree hotel and found dead more than half a day later.
She drowned and suffered “mechanical asphyxia,” according to the Harris County medical examiner’s office.
The pool was found to have multiple violations after being renovated and did not comply with federal laws meant to prevent drownings, according to reports.
Aliyah’s family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the hotel and its parent companies, accusing them of gross negligence and seeking more than $1 million in damages.
A Hilton spokesperson said in a statement: “Hilton extends our sincere condolences to the family and loved ones on the tragic loss of a young girl at the DoubleTree by Hilton Houston Brookhollow.
“This property is independently owned and operated by a third party. Hilton does not own, manage or control the day-to-day operations of the property and does not employ any of the property’s staff or its third-party operators,” the representative said.
New York Post
