Frightday Six: The Mystery of Elisa Lam

This is one strange and sad tale. And there’s a video. A weird video.

The Elisa Lam mystery stands out for a few reasons. Firstly, this is no centuries-old fireside tale with scant photographic evidence and super-dodgy sources. Secondly, the manner of her death has been debated furiously in some corners of the internet, with it appearing almost like a Jonathan Creek-style locked-door mystery. Finally, what happened with Lam’s body was truly the stuff of nightmares.



Elisa Lam was a 21-year-old tourist from Canada. On the 26th of January, 2013, the student checked into the 600-room Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles by herself. Apparently, this would be a short stopover in the city on her way to Santa Cruz. Five days later she was reported missing by her parents after her daily phone calls home stopped. About a month after these events, the Hotel’s management team began to hear reports of problems with the rooms’ supply of water. Complaints included erratic drops in pressure, unusual colouration, little more than a trickle available and "a very funny, sweet, disgusting taste.” to the water when drunk. Investigation of these reports by the maintenance staff uncovered the unthinkable in one of the Hotel’s rooftop water tanks: it was Lam’s corpse.

Guests had “brushed their teeth, bathed and drank with water from [the tank] for as long as 19 days” while Lam’s decaying body floated about in the water—became the water.


The Mystery

Nightmarish, indeed.

So what was she doing in the water tank? The first explanation I heard at the time was suicide but, almost immediately, questions arose that seemed at odds with this: how did Lam get, undetected, onto a roof that was “barricaded throughout” and the area fitted with an alarm and only accessible to employees? if Elisa Lam committed suicide how could she possibly climb into one and close the (apparently heavy) lid behind her? how did she manage to drown herself when nothing to hold her down was found with her? why did she have no clothes on?

Media photography revealed that the water tanks were so tall that the fire crews trying to release her body needed ladders to access the tank.



In the end, the death was ruled to be an accidental one, by drowning. Her body tested negative for drugs and there was no sign of physical trauma to it. The LA County Coroner’s office listed her suffering from bipolar disorder as ‘significant’, but it seems that no further details regarding this ‘significance’ have come to light.


The Mystery Deepens

Just before Lam died, the Hotel’s security camera captured images of her. The footage shows Lam entering the lift and pressing a lot of buttons before staring closely at her selection. She then seems to huddle in the corner, as if wary of someone looking for her, before peering cautiously into the corridor. This sort of peculiar behaviour goes on for a while, with the lift door remaining open the whole time. Eventually, she makes her way back into the corridor before gesticulating as if speaking to someone. At 2:29 there seems to be someone else’s foot slightly in frame that Lam then steps over, and the movements of her fingers and feet are very strange. Then the lift doors close and the video ends.

One source mentions that the video has been cut, with a section deleted, although I haven’t got time to dig into this in search of veracity. I’ll post the video here for those who wish to watch.


Needless to say, as with most mysteries, the Elisa Lam case has been explained in every way possible: from evil paranormal forces at work (very much including demnons) to a killer employee to government conspiracies. Normally I’d list here the possible explanations behind the mystery, but they are numerous and I don’t have time to research and write up each one. Instead, perhaps interested readers could do some independent research and post back their conclusions?


The Hotel

The Cecil Hotel (which is only a short walk from the notorious LA Skid Row) would have provided enough of a creepy cup of copy even without the recent death of Lam because it is a place not unaccustomed to violent death. Notorious serial killer Richard Ramirez stayed on the 14th floor while killing something like 18 people in the 1980s; and Jack Unterweger murdered three women in 1991 there while working as a crime journalist. A few decades earlier the Hotel was the scene of many suicides and at least one murder. Three are detailed below:

“Helen Gurnee, in her 50s, leaped from a seventh floor window, landing on the Cecil Hotel marquee on October 22, 1954.

“Julia Moore jumped from her eighth floor room window on February 11, 1962, she said. Moore left behind a bus ticket from St Louis, 59 cents and an Illinois bank account book showing a balance of $1,800.

“Pauline Otton, 27, jumped from a ninth floor window after an argument with her estranged husband on October 12, 1962. Otton landed on George Gianinni, 65, who was walking on the sidewalk 90 feet below. Both were killed instantly.
"’Pigeon Goldie’ Osgood, a retired telephone operator, was found dead in her ransacked room on June 4, 1964. Osgood, known for protecting and feeding the pigeons at nearby Pershing Square, was stabbed, strangled and raped. The crime has not been solved.”

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Even Elizabeth Short, the much written-about ‘Black Dahlia’ “is alleged in at least one book to have hung out at the Cecil and drank at the bar next door before she disappeared in 1947.” Whatever happened to Elisa Lam, I hope her family receive some kind of closure.


Fancy more creepy reads?
Frightday 1: The Cooper Falling Body Photograph
Frightday 2: What’s your Ghost Name?
Frightday 3: The Mystery of the Chase Coffins
Frightday 4: Robert the Haunted Doll
Frightday 5: The SS Watertown’s Floating Faces


Sources

Very interesting and a great post, enjoy some stars.

Great read

I remember when this story broke. Imagine spending the better part of two weeks showering every morning in the fluids of a decomposing corpse. And drinking it too.

Grim.

Another good Friday read!

I seem to recall a horror movie about someone dead in a watertank on the roof of an apartment block, it was one of those Korean/Japanese ones..what the devil was that called??

Ah yes...Dark Water, the western remake of it had Jennifer Connelly in it. Interestingly, the film came out before the Lam events

I think the foot at 2.29 is just the back of her left foot from where she turns, it's still very strange behaviour though.

Tombstone said:

I seem to recall a horror movie about someone dead in a watertank on the roof of an apartment block, it was one of those Korean/Japanese ones..what the devil was that called??

Ah yes...Dark Water, the western remake of it had Jennifer Connelly in it

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Good movie(s) that. Didn't hold much hope for the western remake but its one of the better ones.

Very sad, but a good read as always. I wonder if we'll ever know

Also, is it creepier because she was Asian? Thanks to all of the Asian horror movies that have had recent-ish remakes

OhEsEcks said:

Good movie(s) that. Didn't hold much hope for the western remake but its one of the better ones.

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yeah, it even had a thing about the lift in it too, which is all curious as the film is from 2002, long before the Lam events.

A great read definitely. Very strange. And what even is she doing in that video?

Those are the creepiest gesticulations I've ever seen!

Really, really odd. Definitely another good find.

Great read and a great thread

another great frightday read.

No clothes and left in there for 19 days? I assume any evidence of being raped would've gone by then and light abrasions etc. Hotel staff done it?

By the look of it she was well off her meds, as for ending up in the tank, common sense says she was put there so the hotel has a killer.

/Sherlock

Tombstone said:

I seem to recall a horror movie about someone dead in a watertank on the roof of an apartment block, it was one of those Korean/Japanese ones..what the devil was that called??

Ah yes...Dark Water, the western remake of it had Jennifer Connelly in it. Interestingly, the film came out before the Lam events

Click to expand...

That remark cropped up in my research with quite a few people pointing out the possibility of a copycat crime, but I didn't have time to fully look into it (and I haven't seen the film).

Edrof said:

That remark cropped up in my research with quite a few people pointing out the possibility of a copycat crime, but I didn't have time to fully look into it (and I haven't seen the film).

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Its quite interesting because the way she is dressed is quite similar to the way the Asian character is in the film, and her mannerisms, movements and gestures are very very similar.

Knowing the Asian (and please excuse the stereotype) penchant for cosplay, I find myself wondering if this was a re-enactment gone wrong, or even possibly someone who lured her with the idea of re-enactment in order to kill her.

I remember reading about this.

I think it was on this very forum.

The general consensus was (I think) that she was tripping (possibly had her drink spiked or took something knowingly) and in her state managed to climb into the tank then couldn't get back out. Apparently LSD will not be detectable after that amount of time which explains why no drugs were found.

I can't remember exactly but the evidence put forward regarding the above theory made a lot of sense.

hmm she clearly parkoured her way up onto the roof and then down onto the water tank.