LAST RESORT

In Los Angeles it's sometimes called the Suicide Hotel because a staggering number of individuals have ended their life by jumping from the windows.

Serial killer Richard Ramirez, also known as The Walk In Killer, and the Valley Intruder, best known as The Night Stalker, called this place home.

Shockingly, serial killer Jack Unterweger did also. Jack was well-traveled. We know with certainty he killed in Austria, West Germany, Czechoslovakia, and the United States. Incredibly, while Jack was killing in the United States he was also doing ride-alongs with the LAPD, because in addition to being a serial killer, he was a reporter that covered crime and was writing extensively on the similarities between crime in America and Europe.

In this photo you can somewhat see a water tower on the roof. In 2013, hotel guests complained of oddly colored and strange tasting water. Sadly, the body of a 21-year-old Canadian, Elisa Lam, was found inside the tower. How she got in there, and why she was in there, is still debated.

When it was built, Hotel Cecil was a marvel of its time, but the Great Depression, a deteriorating Skid Row neighborhood, crime, a lack of parking, and a train station that was relocated further away, all helped to turn a luxury destination into a low-cost last resort housing option.