TOWSON, Md. – A man, two women and a teenage girl were found dead Monday inside a hotel guest room in suburban Baltimore, though authorities have not said how they died or whether they were related.
Autopsies were planned for Tuesday, and the identities have not been released. Investigators have released few details, though Baltimore County Police Cpl. Michael Hill said police weren’t looking for any suspects. However, it’s unclear whether the deaths were a murder-suicide.
Hill said late Monday that the four people are related, but declined to say how. He also said they are not from the Baltimore area and police are trying to contact the next of kin.
The bodies were discovered at the Sheraton Baltimore North Hotel in Towson, just north of Baltimore and just inside the Baltimore Beltway, said Baltimore County Police department spokesman Bill Toohey. Police received a call at 2:56 p.m. Monday reporting that four people were dead in a room.
When police arrived, hotel management helped them clear out guests on the 10th floor so officers would have the floor to themselves. But the hotel was never evacuated or locked down.
The occupants of the room didn’t check out when they were expected to Monday afternoon, Toohey said. That’s when hotel staff unlocked the door and found the bodies. Hill said it was not known whether all four people were hotel guests.
Hill said it would take at least several hours for crime scene technicians and a medical examiner to collect evidence. He said that the bodies were still in the hotel room as of 8 p.m. Monday and that police were still trying to identify them.
“We can’t say how this happened or exactly when it happened so to release anything would be very, very premature at this point,” he said. “We don’t know even what kind of investigation we’re dealing with at this point.”
Several hotel employees declined to comment.
K.C. Kavanagh, spokeswoman for Sheraton Hotels and Resorts, said Sheraton Baltimore North is a franchise property and the owner of the hotel is GF Hotels.
“This is just a terrible tragedy and our team is terribly saddened by this event,” Kavanagh said. “We’re doing all we can to assist the police and it’s a matter that’s in their hands at this time.”
A call to GF Management Co. in Philadelphia was not immediately returned.
Nick Gelston, 30, an electrician from Bel Air, said he stayed at the hotel Saturday night to attend a friend’s wedding. He was back there Monday afternoon because his car had broken down and he’d had to leave it at the hotel.
“I hope it was nobody who was with us,” Gelston said, adding that he wasn’t aware that any of the wedding guests had stayed on the 10th floor.
Melanie Morris, a cosmetics trainer from Birmingham, Ala., checked into the hotel Monday afternoon and said she was “a little scared” to see police cars outside.
“The front desk said there was an incident on the 10th floor and there was no immediate danger to the guests,” Morris said.
She said she had stayed at the hotel before and always found it to be pleasant and well-run. Her room cost $167 a night.
