Skip to content

Netflix’s Cecil Hotel crime documentary tells tale of B.C. student’s mysterious death

Elisa Lam, a student at UBC, disappeared while staying at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles in January 2013
24188368_web1_BLANK-SPACER650x1

A true crime documentary premiering on Netflix Wednesday (Feb. 10) will tell the tale of a B.C. university student whose death at a Los Angeles hotel with a checkered past remains mysterious more than eight years later.

“Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel” tells the story of how the Elisa Lam, a student at the University of B.C., disappeared while staying at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles in January 2013. Lam’s disappearance sparked weeks of searching and made international headlines, especially after the Los Angeles Police Department released video of her last known sighting. In the video, Lam is shown making unusual gestures and moving in an odd way.

Lam was first reported missing on Jan. 31, 2013. Her body was found two-and-a-half weeks later in a water tank atop the Cecil Hotel after guests complained about low water pressure and how their water was odd tasting and a darkened colour.

Netflix’s docuseries, directed by Joe Berlinger, the director of “Conversations With a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes,” comes in four parts, all available as of Wednesday.


@katslepian

katya.slepian@bpdigital.ca

Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Want to support local journalism during the pandemic? Make a donation here.