Netflix’s Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel has thrust the case of Elisa Lam and the history of the Cecil Hotel back into the headlines. This return comes much to the chagrin of former manager of the hotel, Amy Price.
Price was the person who provided the infamous elevator video of Lam to police, calling it bizarre and claiming she handed it over as soon as it was presented to her. But there is one part of the story that sticks in her craw and has her wanting to clear the air. According to a chat with E! News, Price was unaware that many claimed the tape had been tampered with before the police received it, sparking conspiracy theories across the internet since 2013.
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“That’s absolutely false,” Price tells E! News about the theories. “I was a little surprised to hear that. I really hadn’t heard that before the documentary. I’m not surprised people feel that way based on the momentum that a lot of the sleuths have.”
According to E! News, Price “cooperated with the police 100 percent” from the time they arrived at the Cecil Hotel. “There wasn’t even a chance to even look at the tapes myself, I just handed them over. I provided a room for them to review them and that’s exactly what they did,” she said.
The Cecil Hotel has become infamous over the decades, so much that the name changed to Stay on Main back in 2011 to avoid the connections. Lam’s disappearance made sure this didn’t work, along with another death, the 18th, in 2015.
The four-part docuseries on Netflix does its best to solve the mystery around Lam’s disappearance and death. The infamous video of Lam on the elevator sparked countless theories and ideas, including those that delved into the supernatural. Many pointed to the 2002 Japanese horror film Dark Water due to the similarities between the film’s plot and Lam’s death and the discovery of her body in the hotel’s water tank.
The final ruling on Lam’s death is that it was accidental and was related to the mental conditions afflicting Lam at the time of her disappearance. Price told her tale in the documentary too, noting that “a lot of feelings did come up” during the filming of the docuseries. The former general manager did make it clear that returning to the hotel was high on her list, focusing instead on interior design and jewelry these days.
