Two lawsuits on behalf of nearly 500 residents near Kirtland Country Club in Willoughby have been filed for alleged violations of decibel levels when allowing skeet shooting.
According to attorney Tim Misny, his firm has filed two lawsuits in Lake County Common Pleas Court.
One is on behalf of Alane Echon, a Kirtland resident whose 8-year-old son suffers from severe sensory issues and has been “brutally traumatized by this ongoing ordeal, and (the second is) a class-action lawsuit on behalf of the hundreds of residents who have been equally traumatized.”
The suit includes a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against the country club.
The country club, located at 39438 Kirtland Road, has had skeet shooting for the last eight years.
Misny accuses the club of lying about how loud the gunshots would be and their guarantees to reduce the noise during the application process to get a special permit from Willoughby.
“The bottom line is that the club never should have gotten the permit to have an outdoor shooting range within a densely populated residential area which includes at least 475 homes, 75 of which are shockingly within 1,000 yards of the muzzles of their guns,” Misny added.
The following statement was sent to The News-Herald from Kirtland Country Club COO/general manager Mark Petzing:
“The Kirtland Country Club has successfully defended itself against a number of similar cases over the past years. We were successful in both the trial court and court of appeals. This latest case is simply another rehashing of the same baseless and frivolous claims that have already been litigated and dismissed. We expect this case will be dismissed as well. Kirtland Country Club will defend itself in court and has no further public comment on this matter.”
According to Misny, the decibel reading recorded in the backyards is consistently in the 90s and in some situations reaches 104. He added to put it in perspective, if a high-powered firecracker, an M80, goes off 4 feet away from a person, the decibel reading registers 102.
The suit names a minimum of 20 John Doe defendants.
Misny offered up several examples of residents affected by the skeet shooting, including an 82-year-old man dying of cancer who could not relax on weekends, a Vietnam vet who had flashbacks triggered by gunshots, a former nuclear submarine commander with PTSD and a grandmother with increased hypertension and grandchildren who won’t visit on weekends.
“It is important to note that none of the residents and/or plaintiffs are taking an anti-gun stance,” Misny said. “The vast majority are gun owners and Second Amendment supporters.”
Misny added the right thing for Kirtland Country Club to do is to spend the money and build noise abatement structures that will alleviate the problem.
