Sangamon County Courthouse, Springfield, Illinois
SPRINGFIELD — The families of four young children and an 18-year-old camp counselor who died at an after-school program in Chatham when a car crashed through the walls of the building housing the YNOT After School Camp in April 2025 have filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the YNOT camp operators.
The lawsuit was filed on April 19 in Sangamon County Circuit Court by attorneys with the firm of Salvi Schostok & Pritchard, of Chicago. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of the families of seven-year-olds Kathryn Corley and Alma Bunnerkempe; eight-year-olds Ainsley Johnson and Bradley James Lund; and 18 year-old Rylee Britton.
The lawsuit also seeks damages on behalf of four children who were injured in the same incident, but survived.
The lawsuit asserts the YNOT camp operators should pay because they allegedly located their after-school program in a building that was too close to a highway and did not install proper safety measures to ensure a vehicle could not careen off the roadway and into the structure while children were in the building.
The lawsuit comes about a year after the five were killed when an SUV driven by 44-year-old Marianne Akers left the roadway on County Highway 5A and drove through a cornfield, before smashing through the outer wall of the YNOT building. According to published reports and court documents, the car then continued driving through the building, killing and severely injuring victims, before finally stopping at the opposite side of the building.
Chatham is located just south of Springfield.
According to published reports, lawyers for Akers say she suffered a seizure while driving, causing her to lose control of her car and crash into the building at a high rate of speed.
The lawsuit names Akers as a defendant, along with YNOT.
The plaintiffs also have left open the possibility of adding additional defendants, potentially including the village of Chatham.
According to the complaint, YNOT allegedly chose to open its after school camp program in that building in 2012, even though Illinois safety regulations under the state's administrative code allegedly prohibited such youth camps from operating in structures within 100 feet of a highway.
And according to the complaint, the village of Chatham allegedly may have permitted them to do so, despite knowing of the state rules at the time.
Neither the village nor any of its officials have yet been named as defendants in the case. Rather, the village is named as a "respondent in discovery," to attempt to force the village to cooperate with the plaintiffs in obtaining information about the permitting approval for the site, and to identify other potential defendants.
The lawsuit further faults YNOT for allegedly not installing bollards or other protective features that could have prevented Akers' vehicle from crashing into the structure.
In statement issued April 22, attorney Lance D. Northcutt, of the Salvi firm, said: “No family should ever have to endure the unimaginable loss of a child. Kathryn, Alma, Bradley, Ainsley and Rylee had their whole lives ahead of them.
"Chatham is a tight-knit community, and this tragedy has deeply affected countless families. These children were irreplaceable. With this lawsuit, the families seek accountability for this profound loss and meaningful safety improvements to prevent a tragedy like this from ever happening again.”
YNOT has not yet responded to the lawsuit in court.
