Elisa Lam's Death

“This was a place where serial killers let their hair down like Richard Rameraze, who would come back covered in blood and no one got a problem with that”(Crime Scene). This is a quote from the Netflix documentary Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel. Elisa Lam’s death has been a controversial topic since her passing in 2013. This is because of the mystery involving her death but, moreso, how it seemed to have just been brushed off by law enforcement. Elisa Lam was 21 years old when she was found dead at the Cecil Hotel in one of the four water tanks on the roof. When she was found, Lisa was completely naked with the lid of the tank closed. The case was closed on February 19, 2013, just 26 days after Lisa went missing. Lisa’s cause of death was said to

How would she lift a 20 pound lid back onto the tank with nothing to stand on? There would have been some distance between the surface of the water and the top of the tank. She might have just been able to touch the lid with her fingertips, but not close enough to place the lid back on by herself. Elisa Lam was murdered and put into the water tank, despite what some might think. The Cecil Hotel was famous for the death and dangerous people living there, so, it isn’t too far-fetched that one of these people could have been staying at the hotel at the same time of Lisa’s death. Although Elisa didn’t take her bipolar medication, it can’t justify how she ended up in the tank by herself. Finally, the fact that there were no ladders on the roof when Lisa died, and the fact that the 20 pound lid was closed, leads many to believe that she was murdered. “The Elisa Lam case was extremely unusual and it raised all kinds of different questions” (Crime