Elisa Lam - What Happened?

[bessie]

So let's try it again. Ask a question; answer a question. It's actually very easy. Just leave out the personal remarks.

:tyou:

 

[Borris]

From near the beginning of this case, the police wouldn't comment on the cell phone and close sources were showing what she looked like without glasses. It could be a real possibility that her belongings, including her clothes would be in her room.

I think the police had announced that they had her possessions but wouldn't be specific on what they kept. I believe they had her glasses because the family knew she didn't have her glasses with her when she went missing. I also think the police didn't have her prescriptions because LE is quoted as saying something to the effect that she was not taking any medications as far as they knew - which leads me to the possibility that she may have walked in on someone stealing her pills. Her blackberry was stolen on the day she checked into the hotel, but she said she lost it at the "speakeasy". It makes me wonder if that phone was part of a series of thefts that is connected to the endpoint.

 

[Conductor71]

I do not think it fair to look at a person's Tumblr site and a 2 min video and declare that she was psychotic. I have not read all of her Tumblr as I feel it disrespectful to analyze every little thing, diagnose, and label her, without really having any clue and no right to do so. If this helped the case at all then I could see, but at this point we are all spinning our wheels.

I haven't read all the original exchange on her mental health, but my experience tells me our conjecture should not go beyond bi-polar disorder. or even mild depression as stated by the LAPD. period. Psychotic is way over the top.

First, I am not an authority or credentialed in psychiatry, but I do have an incurable condition which stems from neurotransmitter imbalance, and I can tell you from experience and exhaustive research that science knows little of the brain; diagnostics and treatment is really still in the dark ages. Diagnoses for most neurological maladies are based on clinical observation, that is essentially not much more than a medical opinion. In my case, diagnostic error rates are 30%, and it is quite common to have to observe a patient over time (course of months) to note consistent behaviors and to substantiate diagnosis. Also, drug trials are often used to in a "challenge". If the drug works for abcd disorder likely that patient has abcd disorder. Hardly scientific. Having a doctor look at that video and conclude she is psychotic does little to sway me especially when there is no context for her behavior. BTW, initial diagnosis rate for Bi Polar disorder is 69%!!!! I have a friend "undiagnosed" with a disorder after 27 years of treatment for it; including brain surgery.

See the study here: Overconfidence as a Cause of Diagnostic Error in Medicine

In looking at her Tumblr notes, EL could have had Bipolar Disorder II which results in mood extremes between depression and hypomania. Not mania. It's mania lite. You do not likely decide to skinny dip in the water tank used for the hotel you are staying in on the night before you check out. She would most likely be super, outgoing, talk incessantly, flirt more openly, etc. In fact, I see hypomania in her Tumblr; it is quite at times obvious in her writing. I could see hypomania fueling her travels and making her more vulnerable to a perp because her reality is slightly distorted making her less inhibited and much more open to suggestion.

Has anyone stopped to look into type I or type II bipolar disorder? EL said she had hypomania. Look at the official medical sites, but more importantly see how people live it. Quoting studies with abstract numbers on which 70% may not even have the disorder being studied means little too.

This is hardly authoritative but it really one of the most clear difference between the types:

Mania may include psychotic symptoms - delusions or hallucinations. Hypomania does not have psychotic symptoms.

The presence of psychosis automatically rules out hypomania.

source: http://bipolar.about.com/cs/faqs/f/faq_bp12dif.htm

Nowhere have I seen EL mention "mania" and trust me when a doctor tells you that you have hypomania and you see yourself as normal when not depressed, you remember the word.

Psychosis is possible in BPD II but only in depression. EL does not look depressed in that video.

Lastly, the Tumblr post on meds is 10 months old; does she ever update? Getting the sweet spot med combo can take over a year. In fact EL says it took 2 years of trying different meds before she found relief with Effexor. How do we even know she was taking those same meds?

I am sure I will get serious flak for this but had to say it. Having said this; I am open to all ideas. Not discounting that she had a time out with reality and that it may have been organic, but we don't know for sure based on info at hand. I am concerned that people who know something are not coming forward because EL's is being dismissed as crazy or on drugs, so why bother.

 

[margarita25]

I voted "Unsure / Do Not Know".

 

[findinganatta]

I think the police had announced that they had her possessions but wouldn't be specific on what they kept. I believe they had her glasses because the family knew she didn't have her glasses with her when she went missing. I also think the police didn't have her prescriptions because LE is quoted as saying something to the effect that she was not taking any medications as far as they knew - which leads me to the possibility that she may have walked in on someone stealing her pills.

I would think the police have known that she regularly took medication by talking to her parents or sister, although not necessarily. According to her blog, she had quite a history with psychology/psychiatry, which I would guess would be known to them, especially given that she lived with them and showed outward signs of serious depression (sequestering herself in her bedroom for extended periods, only completing three classes after three years of attempting college, despite being very obviously smart). I don't know... just thoughts.

I almost feel like the cops defaulted on the side of not giving out any info except for very basic ones that could easily be found by the media. It's really crazy how little info they've released... it's unprecedented in any potential-murder/foul play investigation I can remember. Makes me wonder if the parents had any ability to influence that... they're clearly private people. Or if EL being from different country played any role.

By the way, I noticed a lot of people wondering if there was more footage of her other than the elevator and maybe the lobby. I'm sure many are already aware of this, but I just saw a police interview for the first time that discussed them having hundreds of hours of footage, with the implication being that she was in much (or all) of it. So I'm speculating that there are plenty of cameras around the building. And that the LE likely have footage of anyone she might have been hanging out with in the building, and they've either ruled them out or don't have strong cases against them.

Her blackberry was stolen on the day she checked into the hotel, but she said she lost it at the "speakeasy". It makes me wonder if that phone was part of a series of thefts that is connected to the endpoint.

Do you know that the phone was stolen, or is that speculation? I ask because I wasn't sure if the authorities had announced that or something.

I just had the impression that she lost it in a bar situation, since that's pretty common.

 

[Conductor71]

This is a link to a good site that references many forensic pathology sources on drowning.

This one quote stood out:

If the circumstances of death are known, the diagnosis of drowning will not present any difficulty. However, when a body is found in water and no circumstantial details are available of how it got there, the case may pose a difficult problem. In some cases, the diagnosis of drowning cannot be established for lack of definite signs; hence one has to draw conclusions on the basis of exclusion of other causes of death. In such situations every detail of the case must be considered with an open mind. (Fatteh at p154)

Networked Knowledge - Medical Issues
Diagnostics of Drowning Cases.

Clearly, in the absence of any new information, we are rehashing and grating on one another's nerves. Maybe we should step back and see if there are any possible clues being over looked like why are the police shutting out the media, and why is the media so damn compliant. There is the issue of the dogs not detecting any scent on the roof. EL's "lost" cell phone and the "friend" in San Diego who gave her the Blackberry. Why did the police say they did not want to talk about her cell phone way back on February 6th, her official missing person's status date? Why hasn't this friend been identified in the media? There is a more realistically timed and cleaned up copy of the video to go over

Looking at the number of mod snips, we need to really take a deeeep breath and let it go. I am sure there is more for us to micro-analyze! :wink:

 

[Conductor71]

Do you know that the phone was stolen, or is that speculation? I ask because I wasn't sure if the authorities had announced that or something.

I just had the impression that she lost it in a bar situation, since that's pretty common.

I was not aware of her phone being stolen. According to Tumblr, the phone was lost at the bar, and a friend gave her a Blackberry to use.

 

[noodled1]

Do you know that the phone was stolen, or is that speculation? I ask because I wasn't sure if the authorities had announced that or something.

I just had the impression that she lost it in a bar situation, since that's pretty common.

According to her Tumblr post she lost a Blackberry phone a friend had loaned her, while in San Diego.

 

[gitana1]

So let's try it again. Ask a question; answer a question. It's actually very easy. Just leave out the personal remarks.

:tyou:

Sorry about that bessie!!! I didn't realize it was out of line.

I do not think it fair to look at a person's Tumblr site and a 2 min video and declare that she was psychotic. I have not read all of her Tumblr as I feel it disrespectful to analyze every little thing, diagnose, and label her, without really having any clue and no right to do so. If this helped the case at all then I could see, but at this point we are all spinning our wheels.

I haven't read all the original exchange on her mental health, but my experience tells me our conjecture should not go beyond bi-polar disorder. or even mild depression as stated by the LAPD. period. Psychotic is way over the top.

First, I am not an authority or credentialed in psychiatry, but I do have an incurable condition which stems from neurotransmitter imbalance, and I can tell you from experience and exhaustive research that science knows little of the brain; diagnostics and treatment is really still in the dark ages. Diagnoses for most neurological maladies are based on clinical observation, that is essentially not much more than a medical opinion. In my case, diagnostic error rates are 30%, and it is quite common to have to observe a patient over time (course of months) to note consistent behaviors and to substantiate diagnosis. Also, drug trials are often used to in a "challenge". If the drug works for abcd disorder likely that patient has abcd disorder. Hardly scientific. Having a doctor look at that video and conclude she is psychotic does little to sway me especially when there is no context for her behavior. BTW, initial diagnosis rate for Bi Polar disorder is 69%!!!! I have a friend "undiagnosed" with a disorder after 27 years of treatment for it; including brain surgery.

See the study here: Overconfidence as a Cause of Diagnostic Error in Medicine

In looking at her Tumblr notes, EL could have had Bipolar Disorder II which results in mood extremes between depression and hypomania. Not mania. It's mania lite. You do not likely decide to skinny dip in the water tank used for the hotel you are staying in on the night before you check out. She would most likely be super, outgoing, talk incessantly, flirt more openly, etc. In fact, I see hypomania in her Tumblr; it is quite at times obvious in her writing. This med cocktail, in fact, makes her more vulnerable to a perp because her reality is slightly distorted making her less inhibited and much more open to suggestion.

Has anyone stopped to look into type I or type II bipolar disorder? EL said she had hypomania. Look at the official medical sites, but more importantly see how people live it. Quoting studies with abstract numbers on which 70% may not even have the disorder being studied means little too.

This is hardly authoritative but it really one of the most clear difference between the types:

Mania may include psychotic symptoms - delusions or hallucinations. Hypomania does not have psychotic symptoms.

The presence of psychosis automatically rules out hypomania.

source: http://bipolar.about.com/cs/faqs/f/faq_bp12dif.htm

Nowhere have I seen EL mention "mania" and trust me when a doctor tells you that you have hypomania and you see yourself as normal when not depressed, you remember the word.

Psychosis is possible in BPD II but only in depression. EL does not look depressed in that video.

Lastly, the Tumblr post on meds is 10 months old; does she ever update? Getting the sweet spot med combo can take over a year. In fact EL says it took 2 years of trying different meds before she found relief with Effexor. How do we even know she was taking those same meds?

I am sure I will get serious flak for this but had to say it.

The conjecture (not diagnosis or adamant conclusion) about Elisa being possibly psychotic is based on more than a 2 minute video and her tumblr site. It's based on several mental health professionals' assessment of the video (every single one who has posted on here), personal experience of posters who have observed psychosis, info on Reddit purportedly from friends of Elisa who say she experienced odd episodes in the past and disappeared before, what Elisa herself posted about her mental illness and her medication, 10 months ago or whenever, and the fact that Elisa ended up dead shortly after appearing to be acting bizarrely in the video.

Some of us have actually looked into the difference between Bi-polar I. and II. I posted a lot of information about it previously.

But here's what I found in a couple of seconds right now:

If left untreated, hypomania can transition into mania and sometimes psychosis, in which case, bipolar I disorder is often diagnosed.[8] (See also, Kindling model) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypomania#Relationship_with_disorders

You are right. We have no idea what Elisa was taking, if anything, medication-wise. It could be she had not been taking any medications at all. Which brings me back to: "If left untreated, hypomania can transition into mania and sometimes psychosis, in which case, bipolar I disorder is often diagnosed."

So, it's true that Elisa could not have been experiencing hypomania at the same time as psychosis but just as with the medication, we have no idea whether she had been hypomanic before her death. It could have morphed, if untreated, into mania.

I have also noticed over the years that people with serious psychiatric illnesses often go through various diagnoses over time. According to this Stanford University lecture outline:

Lecture Outline:

• Misdiagnosis difficulties delay proper treatment
• Similarities between schizophrenia and bipolar
• A categorical vs. a dimensional approach to psychiatric disorders
• Differences between schizophrenia and bipolar - clues to diagnosing one vs. the other
• Summary and conclusion

Editor's Note: the following is a summary of a lecture given by Dr. Terence Ketter, Associate Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences and Chief of the Bipolar Disorders Clinic at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Direct quotes will be indicated with quotation marks; any other text is paraphrase based on Dr. Ketter's words.
According to one study surveying members of the National Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance, there is an average delay of 10 years from the first onset of symptoms to correct diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric disorders. This is an immense and potentially dangerous delay - schizophrenia and bipolar disorder can easily become degenerative diseases, with more and more brain damage occuring as psychotic or mood episodes continue unabated. Dr. Ketter cited some of the major reasons for this delay between symptoms and treatment, including:

• People do not realize that their experiences are out of the spectrum of normal behaviors.
• Frequent midsiagnoses (for example, misdiagnosis of bipolar as unipolar depression, or misdiagnosis of childhood-onset bipolar disorder as ADHD) delays correct treatment for the true condition.

These misdiagnoses can cause years of delay to proper treatment, with potentially destructive results. Imagine, for example, treating a child who actually has pediatric bipolar disorder with ritalin for a supposed case of ADHD. Giving such a child a stimulant can lead to mood destabilization. Similarly, giving a patient in a depressive episode antidepressants (the standard treatment for unipolar depression) without a mood stabilizer will potentially destabilize someone with bipolar disorder.
Schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are are often misdiagnosed as one another, and this is not so surprising when we consider how much the two disorders have in common. http://www.schizophrenia.com/stanfordtalks/diffdiag.html

(I think the italicized part is interesting as well).

Elisa was at just about the right age for adult onset of schizophrenia, for example. A lot of anecdotal evidence I have uncovered on the net indicates people with schizophrenia are often first diagnosed with one of the bi-polar types. It has to start somewhere. That could have been happening to Elisa as well.

It's also true that Elisa doesn't look depressed in the video. But what does psychosis look like that erupts from depression? Does it have to manifest in catatonia or can it look active?

Finally, the very fact that after appearing to act bizarrely, with exaggerated body movements and hand gestures, etc., in an elevator, Elisa ended up dead, may lead to the consideration of psychosis because psychosis is a very dangerous time for people.

Here is the case of Mitrice Richardson:

In the parking lot Mitrice cut the engine and waited for the valet, but by the time he was ready to park her car, he found her seated in his vehicle, which was nearby with the door open. Hazel eyed, with curly locks sticking out of her Rastafarian-style hat, she wore a long-sleeved white T-shirt under a black Bob Marley tee, Vans, and fashionably distressed jeans with a pink alligator-pattern belt. The valet asked Mitrice why she was there. “It’s subliminal,” she said and muttered about avenging the death of Michael Jackson. Mitrice gave the valet her keys and, before making her way into the restaurant, asked, “Vanessa* here?”—as if he knew the person she was asking about. She said to keep an eye out for a girl with tattooed arms.
Mitrice appeared harmless, but to play it safe the valet warned the hostess she seemed pretty weird. Sitting at her table, Mitrice ordered an Ocean Breeze cocktail and a Kobe steak. She wasn’t alone for long. Drawn to the chatter coming from a table of seven, Mitrice seated herself there and tried to join the conversation, yammering unintelligibly about astrological signs. A staffer checked in with the patrons. Everything was fine, one indicated—bizarre but manageable. Though Mitrice went back to her table to eat, she returned later to jabber more. She was going to Hawaii, she announced, and would contact them when she arrived.
After the seven diners had departed, Mitrice walked toward the entrance, where the manager intercepted her and asked how she planned to pay her $89 tab. The other table should have covered her, she explained, but the manager informed her that this was not the case. “I am busted,” she said. “What are we going to do?” As the manager spoke to her, Mitrice gazed at the numerical patterns on a restaurant computer screen, as if in a trance. She told him she was from Mars and remarked about settling her debt with sex.

“I would probably wait till, you know, early this morning, and if she doesn’t turn up, you can certainly call,” Bomgardner advised. Sobbing, Latice told him that she believed her daughter to be “highly depressed” and “in a depressive state.” Bomgardner tried to soothe Latice and suggested, “Why don’t you wait a couple hours and give us some time” to make sure Mitrice wasn’t asleep in the lobby. “Then why don’t you give us a call back in a couple hours, and if she hasn’t shown up or made contact with you, then maybe we can do something for you.”

When the LAPD got ahold of journals from Mitrice’s Civic, they concluded that she’d been sleep deprived for several days and could have been suffering a bipolar episode the night of her arrest. Police also found her ATM card, checkbook, and cell phone in the car.

By then Mitrice had fallen for a Long Beach woman named Vanessa, a regular at the club where she danced. That Vanessa had a girlfriend only made Mitrice more determined to win her over. She became obsessed. One night after her go-go job, Mitrice drove solo to Las Vegas to join in Vanessa’s birthday celebration. Eventually Vanessa had to tell her to stay away. Mitrice’s behavior was becoming bizarre. She didn’t talk on the phone as much. She posted frequent musings on MySpace at all hours (“have u ever woke up 7am crying on a Saturday cuz now that u see the lite u see all the ppl lost in the dark?? welcome to my reality…&#8221. Something was off. She’d talked to at least one friend about seeking therapy, but as far as anyone close to her knew, she’d never dealt with mental illness. As her ex-girlfriend Tessa put it, “Mitrice wanted people to think she had everything under control.”

http://www.lamag.com/features/2011/09/01/what-happened-to-mitrice-richardson

Much more at link.

Mitrice's body was found 11 months later, unclothed. Many of her clothes were founds strewn about the area where she was found. She had never experienced psychosis prior to the time right before she went missing.

This is not the first such case. It happens. In fact, first episode psychosis can apparently be very, very dangerous because no one is expecting it (from what I have been reading).

And the bottom line for me is that it appears clear that LE is seriously considering the possibility that Elisa's death was related to a mental episode. And they have all the information. We don;t.

 

[gitana1]

This is a link to a good site that references many forensic pathology sources on drowning.

This one quote stood out:

If the circumstances of death are known, the diagnosis of drowning will not present any difficulty. However, when a body is found in water and no circumstantial details are available of how it got there, the case may pose a difficult problem. In some cases, the diagnosis of drowning cannot be established for lack of definite signs; hence one has to draw conclusions on the basis of exclusion of other causes of death. In such situations every detail of the case must be considered with an open mind. (Fatteh at p154)

Networked Knowledge - Medical Issues
Diagnostics of Drowning Cases.

Clearly, in the absence of any new information, we are rehashing and grating on one another's nerves. Maybe we should step back and see if there are any possible clues being over looked like why are the police shutting out the media, and why is the media so damn compliant. There is the issue of the dogs not detecting any scent on the roof. EL's "lost" cell phone and the "friend" in San Diego who gave her the Blackberry. Why did the police say they did not want to talk about her cell phone way back on February 6th, her official missing person's status date? Why hasn't this friend been identified in the media? There is a more realistically timed and cleaned up copy of the video to go over

Looking at the number of mod snips, we need to really take a deeeep breath and let it go. I am sure there is more for us to micro-analyze! :wink:

BBM. It is frustrating that the media seems not to care whether they get info from the police or not. I would like to see the media demand more answers.

I certainly don;t want any investigation compromised but sometimes a case is not worked as hard as it could be or as well as it could be and while I have no info to indicate that's happening here, a bit of pressure might lead to accountability.

 

[noid]

This is my first post so if it's in the wrong thread I apologize. I have read most of the info on EL. But I haven't seen anything about what of her belongs they found. Just that remark about not wanting to discuss her phone.

She was supposed to check out of the hotel on the 1st but didn't. The police began looking for her on the 6th due to her parents insisting she was missing. On the 1st what would the hotel do when she didn't check out? Clean the room. Remove anything she abandoned, charge her credit card - what would they do with her belongings? Box them to keep if she returns? What is the law on items left in a hotel room? I'd imagine her parents would have called the hotel asking about her after a couple of days. Unless her personal items were kept secure and the room not cleaned, evidence would have been lost - whether she left that room on her own or by force. Does anyone know what the hotel would have done when she didn't check out on the 1st?

 

[findinganatta]

I do not think it fair to look at a person's Tumblr site and a 2 min video and declare that she was psychotic. I have not read all of her Tumblr as I feel it disrespectful to analyze every little thing, diagnose, and label her, without really having any clue and no right to do so. If this helped the case at all then I could see, but at this point we are all spinning our wheels.

Respectfully snipped...

No one (or very few people) have declared that she was psychotic. It's simply been a theory based on very strange behavior indicative of psychosis due to drugs or mental illness. I agree that lots of mental illnesses are very overdiagnosed, but if Elisa's own consistent accounts of her life are to be believed, I think her bipolar diagnosis was accurate (to the extent that DSM psychiatric labels in general are legitimate).

She apparently spent long periods (weeks? more?) hidden away in her bedroom due to depression, that much is clear in her writings. It was to the point that she completed only three classes in three years of college. And based on the things she wrote while having what she labelled a hypomanic episode, she definitely had very real mania issues--I suspect they might have been beyond hypomania based on the vivid descriptions she gave of what she was thinking/feeling/experiencing. I'm not an expert, but I do have a good amount of knowledge and first-hand experience working with individuals with such mental illnesses, for whatever that is worth.

And one last thing... psychosis isn't necessarily that extreme of an occurrence for bipolar people, from my understanding (which is not to say average bipolar people experience it--just that it's not at all unheard of). It can be a rare event in one's life, triggered by unusual situations as opposed to being a consistent, defining trait of their personality. And of course there is always the drug possibility, or the less-likely possibility of initial onset schizophrenia.

The reasons that I am fairly convinced some form of psychosis was involved in EL's final day(s) (among other reasons that I know I'm forgetting at the moment, but have covered in previous pages/threads): what I believe to be a serious bipolar disorder that she struggled with, which involved hypomania states bordering on disconnection with reality--potentially exacerbated by SSRI meds and/or Adderall; the elevator video, in which she appears to me to be disconnected with reality (which I suspected the first time I saw it, before I heard anyone else suggest it); descriptive and bizarre entries in her blog about thoughts/feelings/behaviors; and supposed witnesses in LA bookstore that said she was bothering other customers with strange, intense behavior.

I'm not married to any of these ideas except the idea that she was bipolar. I personally believe there is sufficient evidence of that, but I'm not completely convinced that she experienced psychosis.

 

[findinganatta]

I was not aware of her phone being stolen. According to Tumblr, the phone was lost at the bar, and a friend gave her a Blackberry to use.

That's what I thought.

 

[Doruk]

<modsnip>



<modsnip> since no one saw anyone else going up to the roof, no one, not even the killer, went up to the roof either, correct?

<modsnip>

Bessie, your modsnip changed the entire context of the one statement you left in my post. Peter Brendt said that no one saw EL going up to the roof and therefore, HIS conclusion was that EL did not go to the roof by herself.

I responded that using Peter Brendt's same logic, since no one saw anyone going up to the roof, therefore, no one (not even the murderer of EL) went to the roof then. In other words, since no one saw anything, no one went on the roof and nothing happened. No murder, no suicide, no accident. But that is using Peter Brendt's logic, NOT mine.

 

[findinganatta]

And the bottom line for me is that it appears clear that LE is seriously considering the possibility that Elisa's death was related to a mental episode. And they have all the information. We don;t.

Snipped...

Your whole post was excellent. This pretty much sums up my feelings about what probably happened to EL, and why.

One of her posts on Tumblr rambles about how she's discovered some way of meeting people involving walking up to them, talking very quickly about random things, immediately walking away, sitting somewhere "with seats that don't face each other" (or something equally nonsensical?), and then she described how this would make the other person want to know you and put them on the defensive in the dynamic. I know I'm getting some details wrong, but I can't find it in her Tumblr right now... but she wasn't kidding around. She was actually trying to communicate something, but it just didn't make any logical sense.

It reminds me a little of the girl you posted about who was approaching strangers and bothering them.

Seems like El's strange behavior was increasing in her last several months through Canada and then California, including her blogs, aimless travelling, talking to strangers, and going out to clubs completely by herself. It kind of makes my blood run cold when I think about the double-meaning of her last post, "'I have arrived in La-La-Land."

 

[BlueShoe]

I believe they had her glasses because the family knew she didn't have her glasses with her when she went missing.

Brilliant! This makes the most sense to me.

 

[BlueShoe]

I agree that one interpretation of EL's behavior could be an episode of psychosis. That is not my own impression, but it certainly is possible. However, I do think it is necessary to unlink her behavior with what happened to her. That is, even if she was psychotic, she could as easily have been murdered as have committed suicide. Or her psychosis could have been caused by a drug reaction or overdose.

Same thing about the clothes. First, we are not sure that she was naked. Second, even if so, we don't know the circumstances of their removal.

The tough part for me to accept is the idea of crawling (or diving) into the water tank. Maybe, if she went onto the roof and believed the water tank lid was the door to her room and she was diving into her bed. Otherwise, the effort seems extreme, and the painful death in a dark, enclosed space just does not strike me as something a delusional person would do. She was only in LA a few nights. Was she hanging out on the roof the entire time so she became familiar with the water tanks? I don't buy it, but have to admit it is only my opinion and based on limited knowledge.

 

[541]

Hey everybody. I'm a long time lurker but haven't really posted anything up until now, as this case has been really intriguing. Upon initially watching the elevator video, I was convinced that Elisa either had some sort of mental breakdown, or a bad reaction to some type of drug she had taken on her own volition. Some details like her Tumblr posts seemed to also point to a mental breakdown of some sort, or at least a history of a somewhat unbalanced mind. Since that theory, I have read up MUCH more on this case (mostly thanks to info from this forum!!), and I now believe that foul play must be involved somehow. Here are a few things that troubled me:

-The fact that she was found with no clothes seemed to back up some sort of mental breakdown until I realized that the clothes she wore on the elevator were not found anywhere on the roof of the hotel or in her room/anywhere else. Of course, the police might have found them and not released that information yet, but if they truly haven't found them, then I believe that is 100% proof that foul play was involved. The only possible thing I could think of that disproves this is if she had somehow managed to get rid of her clothes in some place other than the hotel, which would also be impossible since she definitely would have been spotted by someone in the process.

-I think there is too much focus on the roof door alarm. There are tons of hotels with doors that are supposed to sound an alarm if opened, especially fire exits, but these seem to always be either disarmed or not working.

-The theory that her strange behavior on the elevator could have been because she was under duress just does not seem likely at all. Though every person acts differently from the next, her bizarre behavior does not seem indicative of any sort of traumatic experience, she is simply too calm and her body language is not panicked at all.

-There are a myriad of drugs I can think of that would cause her strange behavior, including Ambien, PCP, Ketamine, Kratom, Salvia, even abusing certain inhalants. And those are just off the top of my head, there's plenty more I can't think of right now.

-I don't think her behavior would be caused by drugs like Ecstasy, LSD, or mushrooms. The typical "loopy" reaction to these drugs are a lot more internal than they are external. Though she does not appear under the influence of alcohol, I would even wager she was very drunk rather than on the drugs I just mentioned.

Based on the video and what I've read about her, I feel as if she would not actively seek out any type of drug, but she would also not refuse to take something if the person she was with offered it to her, especially if she was trying to make friends/have a fun time. Another theory I have is that she could have been slipped a drug unknowingly, but I would assume it would be some sort of date-rape drug like GHB/a strong Barbiturate.

I've stayed up really late so forgive me if the above post sounds rambling/confusing. I'm sure some of what I posted has already been mentioned but I thought I'd share my thoughts anyway. It's pretty cool to have a forum like this to bounce ideas off each other and play detective. Please do not refrain from correcting/debunking my theories!

 

[541]

I also forgot to add that during the elevator video, at around 2:24, it seems as if she is being pulled by someone. I remember someone pointing this out but I can't find that post now. At first I thought nothing of it, but if you look at the sudden change in the angle of her feet, you can clearly tell she either

A) fell/stumbled

B) was being pulled by her hair

Referring to this specific video, I know some are shorter so the time is off. On this video it starts at 2:24

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3TjVBpyTeZM#!

 

[Conductor71]

I just wanted to remind everyone that there is now a cleaned up copy of video that plays in the proper time frame. For some reason the one LAPD released is slowed down so this may affect your current stance on the case.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YO4QbaNDjI"]Elisa Lam Time Stamp Conspiracy MUST SEE! - YouTube[/ame]