Global Courant
Two bodies were found in the hotel room, one on the shower floor. Now an investigation has been launched into the death of a couple in Orange County, and the tony Baja California Sur resort where they were found has closed its doors.
The $600 per night Rancho Pescadero Hotel in the resort town of El Pescadero closed on Sunday, a spokesperson for the Hyatt property confirmed to The Times on Thursday. It is a temporary closure while an official investigation into the June 13 deaths is underway. But a statement from the hotel says Hyatt is “working with the hotel owners … to conduct a comprehensive, third-party-led, independent investigation into the incident.”
Hyatt did not respond to further questions about the investigation, merely noting that guests planning to stay at the resort were approached by Hyatt staff. Some were directed to the Cape Hotel, a Hyatt property about 70 miles southeast of El Pescadero in Cabo San Lucas.
Hyatt mentions Lisa Harper of Rancho Resorts as the adult resort owner.
An email to Harper on Thursday afternoon was not immediately answered.
The shuttering comes after Newport Beach resident John Heathco, 41, and Newport Beach resident Abby Lutz, 28, were found dead in their room last week.
Forensic investigators working with the Attorney General’s Office in Baja California Sur determined on June 15 that the cause of death “Poisoning by (a) substance to be determined.” That poison is still under investigation.
The doctors added that they found no evidence of violence and that the couple had died “between 10 and 11 am” before their bodies were discovered.
Hotel workers found Lutz in the couple’s room and Heathco on the shower floor after they entered a little after 9 p.m. on June 13, according to a police report obtained by The Times.
According to Lutz’s sister Gabrielle Slate, Lutz and Heathco were initially treated at the hospital for what they thought was food poisoning. GoFundMe page. They even seemed to recover before Slate was alerted that the pair had been found dead.
“We received a call that they had passed away peacefully in their hotel room in their sleep,” she wrote.
“We were told it was due to improper ventilation of the resort and may have been carbon monoxide poisoning.”
A former Rancho Pescadero manager, Ricardo Carbajal, said on June 16 that the resort’s management ignored signs of a possible gas leak and disconnected the carbon monoxide detectors that often sounded the alarm.
Carbajal said the monitors rang almost constantly for three months in 2022 — which he attributed to likely gas leaks.
According to Carbajal, Hotel Pescadero management finally disconnected the detectors in January after complaints from multiple guests.
“They knew there were problems with gas leaks,” said Carbajal, who ended his tenure at the resort in March. “Everyone was aware of the alarms and that the detectors were off.”
Two current employees, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared for their jobs, also said hotel managers ignored complaints about the strong smell of gas.
“Housekeepers reported gas leaks, security reported gas leaks, maintenance workers reported gas leaks,” one of the employees said on Sunday. A few days before the guests were found dead, a housekeeper who was cleaning their room fell ill due to suspected gas poisoning, the employee said.
Initially, the hotel’s general manager, Henar Gil Rios, said in a statement that she was “not aware of any threat to the safety and well-being of guests.”
Hyatt said in a statement on June 16 that Mexican “authorities immediately tested room air quality after responding to the situation, reporting no findings of gas or carbon monoxide at the time and recommending that the hotel has clearance to proceed normal operations.”
While Hyatt did not answer questions about its detectors, the company said it would close the hotel to its guests as a precaution.
“The property will not resume normal operations until our investigation is complete,” a company statement said. “Local authorities have not yet released the findings of their ongoing investigation, to which Hyatt and the hotel owners continue to cooperate fully.”
Slate wrote an update on Sunday saying the fundraiser she set up had raised more than $30,000 to bring her sister’s body home for burial.
“Donations from family and friends have been extraordinary and we have received donations from people we have never met,” Slate wrote. “We are so deeply humbled yet in awe.”
Times staff writers Alexandra E. Petri and Kate Linthicum contributed to this report.
