Cincinnati lawyer Stanley Chesley has filed two civil suits on behalf of family members who lost loved ones this year.

        Both suits have been filed in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court and seek more than $25,000 in punitive damages.

        Edward and Paula Kuchmar of Blue Ash lost their daughter, Monica, 16, in the July floods. She was a passenger July 18 in a sports-utility vehicle that became trapped in flash-flood waters. The waters ripped through a Symmes Township creek that led to the Little Miami River.

        Monica tried exiting through a passenger side door. She fell over a retaining wall near a Walgreen's store on Loveland-Madeira Road and was submerged by rushing creek water. Her body was found in the river, near Lake Isabella Park.

        Mr. Chesley is helping the Kuchmar family sue the two drivers — Brian Peters, 21, of Golf Manor, and Kimberly Hayman, 17, of Loveland, who tried driving through the waters. Kimberly had been driving but eventually asked Mr. Peters to take the wheel. He was the driver when everyone bailed from the car, Mr. Chesley said.

        Walgreen's, Hamilton County commissioners, several insurance and development companies, the Ohio Attorney General's Office and the city of Loveland, whose emergency crews responded, also were sued.

        In the suit, Mr. Chesley said that the drivers' gross negligence, the retaining wall that protected Walgreen's but was poorly designed, and other factors all led to “one catastrophic and cataclysmic event that caused Ms. Kuchmar's death.”

        “This is one of the most tragic incidents to occur in our commu nity,” Mr. Chesley said.

        “Not only should this never have occurred, but it must never happen again. Every day we have auto accidents, but this is one of those things that never should have occurred.”

        Mr. Chesley also filed a suit in September on behalf of Victoria Ellison of Batavia, who lost her husband, volunteer firefighter Bill Ellison, in a Miami Township house fire.

On March 8, he fell about 10 feet through the first floor and into the basement of a burning house on Jordan Road.

        He died March 20.

        Mrs. Ellison is suing the home owners, Louis and Tina Bruemmer, and the contractors hired by the couple to install heating and duct equipment.

        The suit contends that the work was negligent and caused the fire.

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