The family of former New York Yankees outfielder Brett Gardner filed a wrongful death lawsuit Friday against the owners and operators of the Costa Rican resort where their 14-year-old son Miller was found dead of carbon monoxide poisoning in March 2025.
Six months after authorities raided Arenas Del Mar Beachfront & Rainforest Resort, the plaintiffs said in the lawsuit that the defendants “failed to comply with basic safety standards,” and the family’s attorney said there was evidence of, and warnings about, the need for safeguards.
The lawsuit added, without providing evidence, that other guests suffered “similar injuries” while staying in the same rooms. Miller Gardner’s parents and older brother became seriously ill, and the lawsuit said Brett Gardner described “fighting for his life” and feeling as if he was “unable to use his arms or legs.”
The Gardner family stayed in rooms adjacent to a mechanical control room from where it said the carbon monoxide emitted, the lawsuit said. That happened because of the defendants’ placement of a gas water heater and failure to provide proper ventilation, according to the complaint.
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“We felt all along that this tragedy could have been prevented, and the preliminary investigation reports confirmed our beliefs,” the Gardner family said in a statement.
The family’s attorney, Michael Eisner, added: “Documents show they were warned and failed to implement simple changes for the safety of their guests. There must be accountability for these types of owner decisions.”
The family is seeking damages for wrongful death, gross negligence and emotional distress, among other things. No criminal charges have been filed, and an investigation in Costa Rica continues.
Two Pennsylvania executives, their venture capital firm and two Costa Rican companies they are connected to were named in the federal lawsuit filed in Pennsylvania. David Callan, director and president of the companies, and R. Scott Williams, the secretary, are the executives named.
Williams did not respond to a message left by ESPN, and Callan could not be reached.
After Miller Gardner died March 21, 2025, Brett Gardner and his wife, Jessica, announced their youngest son’s death March 23 in a statement released by the Yankees. According to the statement, Miller Gardner fell ill along with several other family members while on vacation.
Two days later, a representative from Costa Rica’s Judicial Investigation Department (OIJ) told ESPN that the Gardner family had “gone to eat at a restaurant and that the food had made them sick.” The spokesperson said the OIJ considered asphyxiation before ruling it out, and the department later told ESPN by text message that investigators believed the death to be accidental rather than the result of foul play.
On April 2, authorities said the death was caused by carbon monoxide, which might have emanated from an adjacent machine room. Two months later, a representative from the prosecutor’s office told ESPN that the case remained under investigation and that prosecutors sought “to determine whether the cause of death was a homicide or not, and, if so, to establish responsibility.”
Three months after that, when authorities raided the hotel to collect additional evidence, a Costa Rican prosecutor told ESPN that the investigation could lead to a manslaughter case.
Miller Gardner played high school football in South Carolina and wore No. 11, which his father donned during 14 MLB seasons, all with the Yankees. Brett Gardner, a popular team leader, was a member of New York’s 2009 championship team and retired in 2021.
ESPN’s Gueorgui Milkov contributed to this report.
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