Over the years, the Cecil Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles has been infamous for several deaths, including suicides and murders. However, the 2013 death of Elisa Lam became internet folklore and her story captivated thousands of amateur detectives.
21-year-old Canadian student, Elisa Lam checked into the Cecil Hotel on January 28, 2013. She studied at the University of British Columbia and was the daughter of Hong Kong immigrants, David and Yinna Lam. Furthermore, she was supposed to check out on February 1, 2013, but when she failed to do so, suspicion began brewing.
Upon entering her assigned room, the hotel’s staff discovered that she had left all her belongings, including her ID and medication. Eventually, when she didn’t show up, a missing complaint was reported. 20 days after her last sighting, on February 19, 2013, a hotel staffer went to the building’s roof to check on the water tanks.
Upon examination, he discovered Lam’s corpse floating naked in one of the four tanks. The case went on for a few months, however, it concluded in June 2013. According to Esquire, officials stated that the 21-year-old was due to drowning by accident. Furthermore, she suffered from bipolar disorder and was on partial medication when she died.
In 2021, Netflix released a documentary, Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel, that delved deep into this uncanny incident.
According to its trailer, its synopsis reads, “From housing serial killers to untimely deaths, the Cecil Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles is known to many as LA’s deadliest hotel. The latest chapter in the Cecil’s dark history involves the mysterious disappearance of college student Elisa Lam.”
The director of Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel is Joe Berlinger.
Former The Cecil Hotel Manager believes Lam got mixed up with “the wrong group of people”
Former The Cecil Hotel Manager Amy Price served the institution till its closure in 2017. Furthermore, she was present when Lam went missing and was ultimately discovered. She also appeared in Netflix’s Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel.
In 2021, Esquire sat down to have a conversation with her, regarding her experience working at the infamous hotel. She stated that she believed in ghosts, however, they were not in charge at The Cecil Hotel. Furthermore, she said that the Lam could have interacted with some bad apples from L.A, which might have led to her demise. She stated, “Well, yes. I had my own hunch but I certainly didn’t think the outcome would be the outcome. I thought maybe she had gotten mixed up with the wrong group of people or something while she was visiting L.A. by herself.
She further said, “I mean, that’s really what I presumed, but I really didn’t think much more aside from that.”
Elisa Lam’s death has been compared to the plot of the 2005 horror film, Dark Water, which is a remake of the 2002 Japanese film, Dark Water. However, both are based on a short story written by Koji Suzuki.
