ELIZABETHTOWN -- The state will not be held responsible for a tragic multiple drowning at Split Rock Falls five years ago.

The New York State Appellate Court has found the state is not liable, overturning Court of Claims Judge Frank P. Milano's previous decision to deny the state's request for dismissal.

The case was first brought to claims court on Jan. 30, 2007, by the families of three young men who died trying to save a friend from a swimming hole roiling in whitewater after a heavy summer rain.

TRAGEDY RECALLED

Ten affidavits from police investigators, Department of Environmental Conservation forest rangers and friends of the victims recalled how a summer outing turned horrific on Aug. 12, 2003, as more than 20 camp counselors spent their day off at a wilderness swimming hole in the Boquet River west of Elizabethtown.

The group had been swimming in the upper reaches of Split Rock Falls since noon that day, when eight in the party left about 3 p.m. to explore a whirlpool 300 yards downstream, the Court of Claims report said.

David Altschuler, 18, entered the whirlpool and began to struggle to stay afloat, the report said.

Jordan Satin, 19, jumped in first to try to help him, and as the two young men continued to struggle against the frothy current, Adam Cohen, 19, and Jonah Richman, 18, jumped in to try to save them.

All four disappeared under the water.

Richman surfaced downstream later that afternoon and could not be revived. The bodies of the other three victims were found the next day using underwater cameras.

Rescue operations deemed the water too high and too dangerous for divers.

Court testimony described the four teens as strong swimmers. All four had swum at Split Rock Falls several times over the years, according to an affidavit from friend Samuel Krause, who went with the party of eight to the lower whirlpool.

Krause said Altschuler jumped into the whirlpool voluntarily.

"Looking at the whirlpool that day, I would not have thought that good swimmers like Jordan, Adam, Jonah and David would have been pulled underwater and had trouble stating (sic) afloat," Krause told the court.

"And I would not have thought that any of them would have drowned."