The Death of Elisa Lam: a TRUE Horror Story

Truth can be much more frightening than fiction. Such is the case of the incident at the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles -- the death of Elisa Lam. And that's proof that while many a horror mind such as Wes Craven can come up with the terrors of Elm Street, nothing beats reality at times. In fact, many of the best horror films and stories end up inspired by real events.

So What Is the Death of Elisa Lam?

Paralyzing, really. And still quite the mystery. No one understands. But on January 31, 2013, there was footage of the lady herself, a blogger traveling the West Coast. She was seen in an elevator at the Cecil Hotel, as you see here:

Interesting. Right? After this footage, Lam literally disappeared. She was checking in with her parents daily until after the 31st. Then dead silence. And no one knew where she was.

Some theorized she was having psychotic episodes of some kind. Others thought she was demonized, possessed by the Devil or some other evil spirit. And still others surmised that there were assailants out of the camera's view, people you couldn't see beyond the scope of the camera inside the elevator. It's hard to tell.

That's Not Even the Freaky Part, as Mysterious as This Footage Is:

Around that same time Lam was having this 'issue' in the elevator, other residents in the Cecil Hotel started complaining about the weirdest thing: the water supply.

Several stated during the eight days of the investigation into the disappearance of Elisa Lam that the "shower was awful," and that when you "turned the tap on, the water was coming black first for two seconds and then it was going back to normal" with the H2O tasting "horrible."

It was at that time on February 19 that a hotel employee decided to climb up to the roof of the Cecil Hotel just to investigate the establishment's water storage tanks....

That's where that employee found the decomposing...naked body of a lady. It was Elisa Lam. And all of her personal items were found nearby.

Chalk It Up to Just an Accident, Right? (The Autopsy Stipulated It as Such)

But hold on a second.... Reports after the discovery showed that access to the roof was secure with an alarm and lock. So it begged the question -- how did Lam get up there in the first place?

We can get into the apparent history of the infamous Cecil Hotel, too: "Night Stalker" Richard Ramirez, a serial killer found guilty for 14 murders back in the '80s, actually lived on the 14th floor of that same hotel for several months back in 1985. Jack Unterweger, another serial killer actually was accused of killing three prostitutes in the Cecil Hotel back in 1991. Unterweger then killed himself while imprisoned in 1994. In 1962, a female guest leaped to her death from one of the hotel's windows, not only killing herself, but a poor pedestrian below.

So, essentially, we have a real-life 1408 a la Stephen King. Yay. Remind me not to stay at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, please.