RCMP say no charges are being laid against a tourist who raised a ruckus in Harrison over the holiday weekend.
A woman checked into the Executive Hotel on Friday afternoon, apparently intending on staying three days in Harrison Hot Springs.
“She had advance reservations for three nights. When she checked in, she was a pleasant lady,” Executive’s manager Kevin O’Neil said Tuesday. “Everything was great.”
But that all changed by the evening, when the woman began calling 911 repeatedly for emergency assistance. Police responded, and were given the hard copy key for the woman’s room. But she had deadbolted the door, causing a standoff. By 1 a.m. Saturday morning, she had jumped through the closed window of her third floor hotel room, breaking the glass and landing on the hotel’s metal and glass canopy.
“She hits the glass canopy, bounces to the ground and then takes off across the street to the apartment condos,” he said.
There, she gained access to the second floor balcony and was eventually taken into custody and delivered to Chilliwack General Hospital to be treated for her injuries.
When the hospital called the next morning to inform the hotel their guest was released, and en route via a taxi cab, O’Neil said they initially weren’t going to let her stay.
However, due to her injuries and her admitting she was on medication and needing a place to “sleep it off” before heading home to Coquitlam, O’Neil decided to let her stay.
“She was pretty sore, pretty tired, completely apologetic. That was understandable,” he said, adding that he felt he could be held “morally, ethically and civilly responsible” if their guest was refused a safe place to stay and ended up crashing her rental car.
But it was with a warning, he added — any more trouble and she would have to leave.
Despite her “subdued and apologetic” demeanor while that deal was being struck, O’Neil said it didn’t take long for the woman to start calling RCMP again. She told O’Neil and RCMP that she had misdialed, and was given the “benefit of the doubt.”
By 10 p.m. Saturday night, she was at it again. This time, ambulance and fire responded as well. The road behind the hotel was blocked, and she was eventually taken to the hospital again. However, O’Neil said she ended up back at the hospital, where she collected her things and finally left.
As someone who has been in the hotel industry for over 20 years, O’Neil wasn’t shocked at the weekend’s events.
“In bigger cities, we have had lots of these things happen,” he says. He just hopes that somewhere along the line, the woman gets help.
“Was it drug induced or was it mental health?,” he asks. “We don’t know.”
RCMP said they suspect drugs were involved.
“And it seems she has some deeper issues,” Constable Tracy Wolbeck said.
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