The woman who died after being pulled from Lake Michigan on Sunday was a well-traveled young lawyer who'd lived in Wisconsin, Arizona, Indiana and South Africa before ending up in Chicago.
Ashley Haws, originally from Green Bay, was one of two people recovered from the water after the boat she was in caught fire and capsized on Saturday. The search for two other people continued Monday.
According to her LinkedIn profile, Haws most recently worked as an associate attorney for the Davi Law Group in Chicago. Her profile stated that she was "only the second person from her entire immediate family and extended family to attend college."
"She was very active, vivacious, fearless, the list just goes on what she was and what she meant to everybody," the law group's founding attorney Dion Davi said, also calling her a "beautiful and brilliant rising star in the legal community."
Haws attended St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisconsin before moving onto Valparaiso University School of Law in Valparaiso, Indiana.
She worked for the Center for Humans and Nature, a non-profit organization with offices in Chicago and New York, and served as a clerk for LaPorte County Judge Kathleen Lang.
"Beautiful, compassionate, caring, very family-oriented, loved her job, loved living in Chicago," the victim's grandmother, Shirley Haws, said.
Haws had been with friends traveling from Michigan to Chicago when the boat they were in caught fire. Haws was in cardiac arrest when she was pulled from the water. She died at Mercy Hospital & Medical Center.
The water temperature Sunday morning was reported to be fewer than 60 degrees, according to Deputy District Chief Ron Dorneker with the Chicago Fire Department.
