Medical Examiner In Boone Best Western CO Deaths Resigns

I’ve done several blogs on the lessons to be learned, and actions that should be taken, after three guests perished from carbon monoxide poisoning in a Best Western Hotel in Boone, N.C.

To refresh your memory, an elderly couple — Daryl Jenkins, 72, and his wife Shirley, 72 — were found dead in hotel room 225 on April 16.

Watauga County Medical Examiner Dr. Brent Hall knew on June 1 that carbon monoxide was the culprit in the death of Shirley, according to lab tests.

But for some inexplicable reason, Hall didn’t warn local police about the threat to Best Western guests until another one of them — 11-year-old Jeffrey Williams — died of CO poisoning the the same room as the Jenkins, Room 225, on June 8, according to The Charlotte Observer and WCNC.

http://www.wcnc.com/news/local/State-failed-to-alert-authorities-about-hotel-poison-threat-211595351.html

Boone police didn’t get toxicology reports from Hall on the couple until June 10. Daryl Jenkins’ toxicology report had come in the day before.

Hall resigned from his post on Friday.

As I’ve written, hotels have an obligation to not just evacuate guests if there is a carbon monoxide leak. Hotel officials need to find the source of the carbon monoxide leak and remedy the situation. The hotel should not take in any guests until this is all done.

In addition, a hotel like the Best Western needs to follow-up with recent guests to determine if they suffered any bodily damage, including brain injury, as the result of their exposure to carbon monoxide.

And there’s a case on point here, which has just come to light. Three days after the Jenkins died at the Best Western in Boone,  a group of girls celebrating a sleepover 13th birthday party in a suite above the contaminated room became ill, according to The Charlotte Observer and WCNC.

http://www.wcnc.com/news/local/Three-days-after-2-died-at-Boone-hotel-a-birthday-party-left-young-girls-sick-211683311.html

 The girls complained of symptoms typical of carbon monoxide poisoning, including headaches and vomiting. The mother who had rented the room, 325, for her daughter’s pool party said she told hotel officials what happened. They were nonchalant and didn’t indicate they would take any action, despite the fact the elderly couple had died just days before of suspected CO poisoning.

The young girls should need to have medical exams.