CA/Canada - Elisa Lam - 21 years old - Los Angeles/Vancouver - 31-Jan-2013 - #3

[Figuring]

Guys, I don't recall anyone saying this. Did you know the rooms at The Stay, many of them are shared with other people you don't know, hostel-style? I did not.

For $35 you share a room with 1-2 others. I know she stayed at a Hostel in Toronto, so this makes sense. But it's possible she may have had a problem with a roommate, as much as someone else who is a permanent residents.

As an aside they have rooms for tomorrow, so it's business as usual, which just seems so hard to believe.

 

[BlazerJH]

As an aside they have rooms for tomorrow, so it's business as usual, which just seems so hard to believe.

Well they do have a business to run (albeit a run-down and mismanaged one). I'm not really sure what else they would do. Just shut down until the police release the tox results or someone is thrown in prison for this?

Giving the hotel the benefit of the doubt, there's a good chance they may not know much more than we do about what actually happened or the investigation. The one area where they clearly needed improvement was limiting access to the roof and I am hoping they have taken measures to secure the roof access as best as possible now.

 

[LittleWing]

This may prove that floor 14 is now the color of pumpkin pie, but it does not prove that she was, indeed, on the 14th floor.

Where is the link to the source of this photo? Who did they get this information from??? It's still speculation until someone can go down there and take multiple photos for us, so we can also compare the tiles etc, or a LE can absolutely confirm it.

Might I reference the footage video, AGAIN. At 3.12. Can somebody please explain to me then why it would appear that 14 turns off here?

If I have any reason to question, I will.
I'm not trying to be combative but we must question EVERYTHING until it is 100% confirmed by a trusted source.


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[Turk February]

This may prove that floor 14 is now the color of pumpkin pie, but it does not prove that she was, indeed, on the 14th floor.

Where is the link to the source of this photo? Who did they get this information from??? It's still speculation until someone can go down there and take multiple photos for us, so we can also compare the tiles etc, or a LE can absolutely confirm it.

Might I reference the footage video, AGAIN. At 3.12. Can somebody please explain to me then why it would appear that 14 turns off here?

If I have any reason to question, I will.
I'm not trying to be combative but we must question EVERYTHING until it is 100% confirmed by a trusted source.


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Also, it appears that the 14th floor was recently re-painted as well.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zkukLsXdE0"]Tour of the Cecil hotel: The BEST hotel in downtown Los Angeles. - YouTube[/ame]

Remember this video where these two people went up the 14th floor? The wallpaper was light green. This video was uploaded on July 4th, 2012.

The above picture showing the 14th floor most likely was taken around February 2013.


My assumption is, Cecil Hotel decided to repaint the majority of floors from 15 down to 1 (excluding floors 4-6 because those are Stay At Main owned floors).

Are the Cecil Hotel owned floors all painted brownish orange/red?

 

[LittleWing]

Well I have had yet another look at the video and I can't explain why the 14 button dramatically darkens except for bouncing light and poor video quality equalling severe pixelization and artefacts, but then you could say the same thing affects all the buttons, not just 14. At different times in the video, especially just before a door opens, the light changes in the elevator, as I've said in a post before. So I am also leaning towards her being on the 14th floor. The simple fact that I can see a slight shift in button 10 at 3:12 and button 7 at the end of the video is what tips it. It would appear that 14 was the unusual one for appearing to darken.


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[LittleWing]

Also, it appears that the 14th floor was recently re-painted as well.

Tour of the Cecil hotel: The BEST hotel in downtown Los Angeles. - YouTube

Remember this video where these two people went up the 14th floor? The wallpaper was light green. This video was uploaded on July 4th, 2012.

The above picture showing the 14th floor most likely was taken around February 2013.


My assumption is, Cecil Hotel decided to repaint the majority of floors from 15 down to 1 (excluding floors 4-6 because those are Stay At Main owned floors).

Are the Cecil Hotel owned floors all painted brownish orange/red?

Yes I know, I said in my first sentence that the walls on 14 have been repainted

Can't blame them for repainting, but this colour choice ....Blegh FTR! Lol

EDIT: as for the Cecil colours being coordinated, it makes sense. Gives it more of a uniform and less trashy feel, and coordinates it with the main coloring of the lobby. It would appear that they were trying to class up the joint a bit!


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[LittleWing]

So I thought that room numbers correspond with the floor number. For instance 14 has rooms 1401, 1402, 1403 etc. but now I'm seeing people with room numbers that don't correspond with floor numbers? This hotel is turning out to be an OCDer's nightmare on top of everything else. Lol


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[Marlon]

You guys want to see the theory of a SERIOUS schyzofrenic? And with serious i mean big time serious!
Checking his blog i Think he's under 24/7 surveilance by an Assertive Community Team (ACT) witch is a group of healthcare pshychiatrists who do intensived theraphy with a mental ill ( including sexoffenders) while the patient stays in the community rather then being locked up in jail/hospital asylum

The guy is a real nutjob and most of what he says doesnt make sense. He has nothing to do with the case tho but id like to share.
http://minddefense.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/elisa-lam-murdered/

 

[kingsway]

I don't get why some of you are still hung up on the floor she was on at the time of the video.

4 buttons light up, all in a row, all in the middle. Can everyone agree at least on this? At 0:09 she presses a button, but it doesn't light up. Then there are 4 that light up, followed by two that don't light up.

So it follows that 14, B, Door Hold don't light up, and 10, 7, 4, M do.

Therefore she must be on the 14th floor - unless the 14th floor button doesn't work.

Can anybody refute this?

 

[Eileen730]

I don't get why some of you are still hung up on the floor she was on at the time of the video.

4 buttons light up, all in a row, all in the middle. Can everyone agree at least on this? At 0:09 she presses a button, but it doesn't light up. Then there are 4 that light up, followed by two that don't light up.

So it follows that 14, B, Door Hold don't light up, and 10, 7, 4, M do.

Therefore she must be on the 14th floor - unless the 14th floor button doesn't work.

Can anybody refute this?

she is on the 15th floor!
she pushes 14 10 7 4 going down!

 

[Turk February]

I don't get why some of you are still hung up on the floor she was on at the time of the video.

4 buttons light up, all in a row, all in the middle. Can everyone agree at least on this? At 0:09 she presses a button, but it doesn't light up. Then there are 4 that light up, followed by two that don't light up.

So it follows that 14, B, Door Hold don't light up, and 10, 7, 4, M do.

Therefore she must be on the 14th floor - unless the 14th floor button doesn't work.

Can anybody refute this?

smeinzer climbed up the Cecil Hotel rooftop via the 15th floor through the fire escape window in the hallway during a Feb.7th-10th stay as a guest. The ladder leading to the rooftop is next to the fire escape on the 15th floor.

If Elisa Lam was on the 15th floor, this means:

A. She got up the rooftop on her own after she walks off camera in the CCTV recording video.

B. She was lured to the rooftop by somebody

C. She was murdered by a person staying in a room or was on the 15th floor



If she went up the fire escape on the lower floors, she would of most likely be detected easier than say, right on the very top where the ladder is on the 15th floor.

A suspect carrying Elisa's body would have an easier time lugging her body up the rooftop via the 15th floor as well than on a lower floor.

Of course... No offense taken at all. I totally understand. And also... I'm glad you mentioned that. I had my dates wrong haha. We checked in on the 7th and checked out on the 10th. Please adjust my dates in the previous post accordingly.

Here is my receipt for my stay... I booked through Hotel Tonight.

Unfortunately we didn't shoot too many photos up there because the shots just weren't that great. My brother did get this shot though. The water tanks are directly behind where I am standing (I am up on the ledge of the building looking out)

As for the photo of the fire escape exit... It looked very similar expect that the window did not have any blinds over it. The window was cracked and had a little resistance but was easy to push open. There was no alarm present on the window. After we were out on the fire escape it was VERY easy to get up the ladder. the ladder came almost all the way down to the metal platform we were standing on. This is the fire escape we used.

After we were on the roof, we stayed for about 15-20 minutes and did not see any security all. In fact the only place I ever SAW security was in the lobby.

Hope that helps. I would happy to answer any other questions people might have.

 

[californiared3]

thing about this thats bothering me is.....

yes the hotel is poorly managed...

yes there are sexual offenders living long-term there....

but doesn't it strike you odd that it just happened to be EL at this material time?

the way it happened....this wasn't a string of murders at the hotel in the last month... and there hasn't been any sort of pattern or links to other missing persons / murders recently near the area unless someone can refute me on this...

this is what is most bothering..... the natural instinct is to point the finger at the registered sexual offenders living there when the fact is....it doesn't take a hotel worker or long term resident to check out the roof and bypassing the alarms just as meizer did....

so a guest could be as culpable as anyone else.

it would definitely depend on a lot of evidence in EL's room and try to piece together not only her final moments like the elevator, but her trip especially the days in LA.

the contents of the postcard if it indeed is authentic, her clothes, the exact rooms, are all critical to the case.

 

[BunnyHop]

Guys I have found something here that is very very fishy.

Ive been meaning to check out whats going on with the time stamp but havent gotten to it. Ive also eluded to that at a certain time I can read either 1:23:00 or 11:23:00. I think its (1:23:00AM).

Here are my shocking and I believe unexplainable findings.

I can see at the 1:21 mark of the video that the minute changes. To me the minute changes to reflect 1:23:00.

It isnt again until the 2:42 mark of the video that I see the minute change again. At this point the stamp reads 1:24. Reflecting 1 minute has passed. However in video time 1 minute and 21 seconds has actually passed. Thats weird.

This is where it gets really weird.

6 seconds of video time passes and the minute changes again to 1:25. This is at the 2:48 mark of the video. We've lost 54 seconds somewhere.

This is where the video glitch happens, which some people chalk up to a lack of motion in the elevator.

If this is the case then we are to assume that the camera shut down during 1:24:06 and 1:25:00 causing us to lose 54 seconds due to inactivity.

During the glitch, or around the 2:54 mark in the video the camera changes from 1:25:05 to 1:25:12 it freezes for a second, becomes 1:25:11, freezes for a second then becomes 1:25:14 and thats where we see the door already half way closed.

These are the notes I made while watching. The numbers on the left are the time stamp and on the right are the video time.
1:23:00 at 1:21
1:24:00 at 2:42
1:25:00 at 2:48
1:25:05 jumps to 1:25:12 back to 1:25:11 then forward to 1:25:14 all between 2:53 and 2:55 video time.

Elisa walks off at 2:30 video time. Which is 12 seconds before the minute changes. The minute that seemingly lasted 1:21 seconds of video time. 6 seconds later and another minute has passed. Seems odd that the video would come back early if put in a sleep mode during those lost 45 seconds or so, then still end up glitching during the door close doesnt it?

Please someone watch this I feel like this is very very odd.

Its also worth noting that at the point where its about to change to 1:26:00 is right exactly when the movie ends.

It also appears that the time stamp starts at 1:22:00 or roughly around there and doesnt change to 1:23:00 for about 1 minute 21 seconds. SO this tape has been slowed down because I can see two minutes now that run for 1 minute and 20 seconds movie time.

Damnit if it starts at 1:22 and runs till exactly 1:26 then thats 4 minutes. The exact length of the video. However clearly I can see 54 seconds missing and what seems like 2 minutes have been slowed down. Stretching out the movie to be an accurate 4 minutes.

I appreciate your input. I agree there's something up with the video.
I had posted something in the last thread.

IMO, staff "partied" on the roof. They knew the ins and outs. They have keys and access. They know where the cameras are, and how to avoid them. Perhaps they know how to disable alarms and cams. They know about the water tanks.

I would like to know how many are on staff there. Maybe some unsavory types, in that neighborhood. :twocents:

 

[kingsway]

smeinzer climbed up the Cecil Hotel rooftop via the 15th floor through the fire escape window in the hallway during a Feb.7th-10th stay as a guest. The ladder leading to the rooftop is next to the fire escape on the 15th floor.

smeinzer didn't mention which floor they were on to get onto the fire escape, but that's irrelevant.

If Elisa Lam was on the 15th floor, this means:

A. She got up the rooftop on her own after she walks off camera in the CCTV recording video.

B. She was lured to the rooftop by somebody

C. She was murdered by a person staying in a room or was on the 15th floor

If she went up the fire escape on the lower floors, she would of most likely be detected easier than say, right on the very top where the ladder is on the 15th floor.

A suspect carrying Elisa's body would have an easier time lugging her body up the rooftop via the 15th floor as well than on a lower floor.

Could happen on the 14th as well. Only a flight of stairs to the 15th.

4 buttons light up, all in a row, all in the middle. Can everyone agree at least on this? At 0:09 she presses a button, but it lights up briefly as she pushes it, then turns dark. Then there are 4 that light up and stay on, followed by two that don't light up.

So it follows that 14, B, Door Hold don't light up, and 10, 7, 4, M do.

Therefore she must be on the 14th floor - unless the 14th floor button doesn't work.

Can you refute this logic?

Also, a picture was shown that the 15th floor button was removed - could this mean that it wasn't working before, even during Elisa's stay? And to get on the 15th, you need to go to the 14th floor? Also maybe access to B is only turned on during working hours, or you need a key to access that level.

 

[BunnyHop]

I hope you all are checking out my time stamp observations.

My questions regarding the time stamp are this:

1: Why are two of the minutes clearly stretched out to last 1:21 seconds each.

2: Why do we see a whole minute go by in 6 seconds? where does the 54 seconds go.

3: Why is this movie clip 4 minutes long on both the video and the time stamp, but is clearly missing footage? Is that to throw off the police perhaps?

4: Would the security company edit this tape to hide something?

5: Did the security company blur the time stamp or did the police? because It seems very much so the time stamp is blurred out.

my earlier post:

read elsewhere an interesting point about the video

"This video was obviously doctored by the hotel staff responsible. at 2:54 you can see the time counter in the bottom left corner freeze 3 times before the door closes. This means that the staff member used his key to unlock the elevator and he had to edit himself out of the video.."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TjVBpyTeZM

[ame="http://www.websleuths.com/forums/showpost.php?p=8920572&postcount=675"]Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - Found Deceased CA/Canada - Elisa Lam - 21 years old - Los Angeles/Vancouver - 31-Jan-2013 - #2[/ame]

 

[LittleWing]

Yes, I agree her room is on the 4th floor, I believe she somehow made the mistake of going to the 14th floor by accident, and she tried to use her key on the wrong room.

I know, this seems far fetched, but I've been working in hotels for years, and this kind of thing happens. Almost always, the person in the room is freaked out, thinking someone's trying to break in their room. Now consider a hotel in Skid Row, where chances are someone IS trying to break in your room, and chances are you're a paranoid drug addict.

She could not use her key on a room on the 14th floor because rooms on the 14th floor require normal keys. If she was indeed staying on floor 4, which is Stay on Main, she would have a key card.


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[Turk February]

smeinzer didn't mention which floor they were on to get onto the fire escape, but that's irrelevant.



Could happen on the 14th as well. Only a flight of stairs to the 15th.


Can you refute this logic?

Also, a picture was shown that the 15th floor button was removed - could this mean that it wasn't working? And to get on the 15th, you need to go to the 14th floor?

Re-posted:

I am new to this site and was brought here by this case. Pretty cool! Thanks everyone for all your ideas... very interesting. I was a guest at Stay on Main, the "hostel" part of the Cecil hotel, from February 7th through the 10th on the same floor that Elisa was on and have a few insights that I thought I could add to this discussion.

First off, do not stay in this area of LA if you are girl by yourself. It is a very interesting area but can be really dangerous.

Accessing the roof
It is easy. I am a photographer and my brother and I went up onto the roof on the night of the 7th to see how the vantage point of the skyline was from there (not that great by the way). And yes... We shouldn't have been there, I know that, but we were and it was easy. There is a window that was open on the 15th floor that allowed access to the fire escape and was just a quick climb up a short ladder and there we were on the roof, and now we know that we were probably only a few feet from Elisa's body at one point. Pretty creepy...

Water pressure and quality
We experienced no strange tasting water or low water pressure from the 5th-8th.

Elevator out of service
The "Elevator 1" was out of service on the 7th and 8th. It was just stuck on the 7th floor. This is probably totally unrelated but I thought I'd mention it just in case there is something to it.

Overheard weird conversation on the 8th
At about 7:30 or 8:00am on the 8th of Feb I woke up because of a loud knock on a room across the hall from ours (I think we were staying in room 406). I did not hear the whole conversation because I was still half asleep, but I definitely heard an exchange with a security guard and what appeared to be a female occupant of that room. It seemed like she had called security to her room. I heard the guard ask "did you see what direction he went?" and "did he have a weapon?". Unfortunately I didn't hear the girl's response clearly. It was a pretty short conversation and it sounded like the guard left and the girl went back into her room. At the time I didn't think too much of it. We were in a sketchy area and I wasn't surprised to hear of something like that. Looking back I wish I would have paid a lot more attention. I have no clue if this is related at all since it was a good 9 days after Elisa disappeared but it just reinforces that the Cecil/Stay is a sketchball spot. Interesting experience though for sure.

During the whole duration of our stay we didn't think anything was abnormal... We didn't see any police or reporters at all. We weren't there much though except to sleep. Also, we were only asked once to see our key card when getting into the elevator one night.

One last thing that I want to mention that I see people bring up a lot in this forum is the question "Well what was she doing in California?" It seems like people are overanalyzing this. I really don't think it's any deeper than she was a Canadian girl who had heard great things about California and wanted to experience it for herself. It is not weird or uncommon to travel alone. I do it all the time. Now, if she went to LA with no plans to see other places then I could see more of a reason to question why she was there, but I think it is literally as simple as a girl who wanted to travel and see California.

I sure hope LE can come to a conclusion in this case, but it seems like a tough one with no big leads (that are available to us anyway).

I can confirm that the B button lights up. I never hit the button but I was in the elevator a couple of times when workers were in there and pressed the B button and it did light up and does indeed go to the basement (I took an accidental ride down there when I got on the elevator too early and had to go down before I went up)

smeinzer said they went to the 15th floor to use the fire escape.

also, smeinzer recalls the B (basement) button on the elevator lighting up, as well as recalling the 15th floor button actually still there while staying at the hotel on Feb.7th till the 10th.

With regards to Elisa being on the 14th floor and then just taking the stairwell to the 15th floor, that is another possibility.

 

[Turk February]

my earlier post:

read elsewhere an interesting point about the video

"This video was obviously doctored by the hotel staff responsible. at 2:54 you can see the time counter in the bottom left corner freeze 3 times before the door closes. This means that the staff member used his key to unlock the elevator and he had to edit himself out of the video.."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TjVBpyTeZM

Websleuths Crime Sleuthing Community - View Single Post - Found Deceased CA/Canada - Elisa Lam - 21 years old - Los Angeles/Vancouver - 31-Jan-2013 - #2

At first I believed that to be the case too with the edit on the CCTV video--

But no, it's not likely hotel staff was responsible for editing it.



I'm sure it was the LAPD who edited that footage, basically to fast track the video to the point where the DOOR HOLD on the elevator finally automatically disabled itself after 3 or so minutes and closed again.



If it was an outside party that edited the footage, media and LAPD would of certainly responded to it by now.

 

[Eileen730]

That's pretty much what I thought.

People can get pretty desperate if they think they will lose their livelihood.

Exactly.

I think this was just a tragedy for all involved.
I think the roof was a very popular place. Esp at night for the view and other things! Very sad and very strange way to die.

 

[kingsway]

Re-posted:
also, smeinzer recalls the B (basement) button on the elevator lighting up, as well as recalling the 15th floor button actually still there while staying at the hotel on Feb.7th till the 10th.

I edited my post above. Maybe access to B is only activated during working hours. There's no point in guests going to the basement right?

In the video, can you see that there are two buttons below that don't light up? I count 7 pushes - off, on, on, on, on, off, off = 14, 10, 7, 4, M, B, DH. Regardless of what other people say, or the color of the wall, there is direct proof in the video that she is on the 14th floor.