The number of lawsuits pending against the developer of the massive BayView project in the Village of Suttons Bay grew to nine last week.

On Dec. 12, National City Bank filed suit against Suttons Pointe Development, L.L.C. The suit also names the corporation’s resident agent, Marcus Yono of Livingston County, and partner Jeffrey Roth of Wayne County, as defendants. Yono, Roth and Suttons Pointe owe the bank more than $625,000, the suit alleges.

Roth is a member of the family owning the former Frigid Foods property where much of the BayView development is located. The Roth family also owns the RLTD Railway Corporation that formerly owned a railroad corridor through Leelanau County now known as the Leelanau Trail, operated by Traverse Area Recreation and Transportation (TART) Trails, Inc. Plans call for the trail to be extended through portions of the BayView project.

The Roth family first proposed plans for developing their Frigid Foods property in 2001, working with a Lansing-based developer, the Granger Group. However, the family’s agreement apparently fell through, and one other developer was considered for the project briefly before the Roths inked a deal with Yono. Yono’s Livingston Building Company and Suttons Pointe Development, L.L.C., are the developers of Phase One of the BayView project.

Jeffrey Roth is also listed in public documents as Yono’s partner in Leelanau Hills Development, L.L.C., a corporation set up to develop Phases Two through Four of the BayView project in the hills west of M-22, up Scott Hill Road. If all four phases of the BayView project are completed as planned, the development will add more than 500 new housing units to the Village of Suttons Bay, more than doubling its size. So far, streets and other infrastructure items have been constructed in Phase Two of the project, along with the uncompleted shells of five “model” homes.

“National City Bank made a loan of $600,000 to Suttons Pointe Development, L.L.C.,” explained William Eiler, a spokesman for National City Bank. “The loan is currently in default and National City has filed an action to recover the funds. Repayment of the loan was guaranteed by the two individuals named in the complaint,” Eiler said.

National City Bank’s suit alleges that Yono and Roth signed documents in June 2007 promising to pay off the bank’s $600,000 loan to Suttons Pointe Development, L.L.C.

Roth could not be reached for comment and Yono did not return a reporter’s phone call.

Eight other lawsuits are also pending against the BayView developer. Three are from people who want their deposits back on BayView units they no longer want to buy. One is a potential “class action” suit from a number of condo unit owners concerned that units they bought for “single family” purposes are now being marketed for “timeshare” or “fractional ownership” sales.

Three of the lawsuits are from contractors seeking payment for work they did for the developer. And one lawsuit is from a furniture company that claims the developer took delivery of furniture for a “model unit” then sold the unit as a “furnished unit” without paying for the furniture.

Yono is named individually in four of the nine suits; Roth in just the latest.