Maybe its a slow news week for hotels, or maybe they don’t have any specials to peddle. Whatever the reason, a lotta hotels are in the news, for all the wrong reasons. And most of the drama is coming out of Denver hotels where the DNC convention is in progress.

For starters, Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) and his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry and her company’s ketchup - Hienz Ketchup, gets some highly unwanted publicity. The Chicago Tribune reveals that Chicago Alderman Richard Mell, along with a group of first time delegates, visited the cigar bar at the famed Brown Palace Hotel in Denver. Seems Kerry walked in a short while later, and Mell asked a couple of women in his group if they wanted to have a picture taken with Kerry.

And then they had the picture taken with the MA Senator and former Presidential candidate. And then they were booted out of the bar and escorted out of the hotel for ‘causing disturbance to other guests’. Mell blames Sen. Kerry for the eviction, and vows never again to use Heinz ketchup. A Kerry spokeperson denied that the Senator  complained to the hotel. Expect this to get a lot of publicity in the days to come.

And also from Denver, Speaker Pelosi was evacuated out of the Grand Hyatt for a short while when a man carrying 2 hunting rifes and 2 guns tried to check in. He later said he had no idea there was even a Convention in progress. Joseph Calanchini of Pinedale, Wyoming does face a charge of unlawful carrying of a weapon, since he didn’t have a permit for concealed weapons.

And in another case of dim-witted rednecks getting caught in the crossfire in Denver, the Guardian reports that an FBI hunt in Denver for threats to Sen. Obama by a neo-Nazi group found one Shawn Adolf, who wore a swastika ring and was wanted on drug charges was arrested when police came to the hotel where he was staying in a Denver suburb. He jumped from the sixth floor window landing on a flat roof with a broken ankle. He still ran, but was arrested.

And in New York, reality star and Dancing with the Stars contestant Kim Kardashian got her foot cut up on a broken mirror in her hotel room. Seems the blood was gushing out of her foot and she is quoted as saying that teh hotel room looked like a ‘murder scene’. 

Moving from New York to Florida, the roof literally came down at the Daytona Beach Regency Hotel when the hotel’s parking garage ceiling collapsed, totalling 7 cars. No injuries reported, although one employee had to run for his life as the roof started coming down.

And a 14 year old French girl died after being sucked into the filter drain at the bottom of the swimming pool at her hotel in Tunisia - the Melia Palm Azur Djerba, in Djerba, about 500km from Tunis.

Posted on August 27th, 2008 by PLing
Filed under: Hotels