Friday, Feb. 29, 2008 | 9:06 p.m.
Newlyweds Chad and Darbi McEwan of Albuquerque, New Mexico pack up their car as they prepare to leave an Extended StayAmerica hotel at 4270 S. Valley View Blvd. Friday, Feb. 29, 2008. The couple were unable to get back into the hotel the night before after the toxin ricin was found in the hotel but were given a complete refund and were going to find another hotel, they said. Seven people, including three police officers, were reported sent to the hospital due to possible exposure to the ricin, police said.
UPDATE
Metro Police on Friday expanded their investigation into why several vials of ricin were found in a motel room at Flamingo Road and Valley View Boulevard, just west of the Strip, to an Excalibur room — but said they do not believe the city is in danger of a terrorist threat.
Police are trying to determine the role of the relative of the sick man in the incident, but said they do not believe he came into contact with the ricin.
Capt. Joe Lombardo of Metro's Homeland Security Bureau said Friday night that the 53-year-old relative of the man who had occupied the Extended Stay America room had also stayed at the Excalibur Wednesday night.
That prompted Metro's hazardous materials team to search the Excalilbur room. But after two hours of searching, no trace of ricin had been found according to Lombardo.
"I want to assure everybody that the Las Vegas Valley is safe," Lombardo said. "We currently don't have a terrorist threat."
New details and a clearer timeline of events were revealed at a press conference Friday night.
Lombardo said that on Feb. 22 a relative of the 57-year-old man who had been hospitalized since Feb. 14 in a local hospital with respiratory problems called the Extended Stay Motel manager to tell him that animals were in the room.
The manager called the Humane Society which rescued a dog and two cats from the room. According to Lombardo, a veterinarian had to put the dog to sleep.
On Feb. 27— almost two weeks after the sick man went to the hospital — the manager went to his room to evict him, but instead, discovered guns and an anarchist-type textbook with information about ricin in it, Lombardo said.
"It doesn't make you a terrorist to have an anarchist-type textbook," Lombardo said.
Police are still investigating how and why the ricin was in the ill man's room.
According to Lombardo, the same relative who reported the animals, visited the room on Feb. 28 to gather belongings and said he found something suspicious. He brought a vial that contained ricin to the manager's office. This was when the police, hazardous materials teams, the National Guard and the FBI were called to the scene, Lombardo said.
"At this time the investigation is ongoing," Lombardo said.
The man who was occupying the room where ricin was discovered Thursday night had called paramedics on Feb. 14, saying he was having trouble breathing, police said today.
Since then, he has been at Spring Valley Hospital in critical condition and unable to speak to investigators about what happened in the hotel room at Flamingo Road and Valley View Boulevard, Metro Police Deputy Chief Kathy Suey said.
Dr. Lawrence Sands, chief health officer of the Southern Nevada Health District, said if a person is exposed to a lethal dose of ricin, death can occur in 36 to 72 hours. However, if someone survives three to five days, recovery is possible.
The laboratory at the Health District confirmed that the white powder found in several vials in a plastic bag was ricin, a powerful substance that is used in organ transplants and cancer treatment, but that can be lethal in doses inhaled, swallowed or injected in amounts that cover the head of a pin.
Police do not know if the substance belonged to the sick man and he is not a suspect, Suey said.
Invesigators and hazardous materials teams arrived at the Extended Stay America Motel after 2:30 p.m. Thursday, when a friend or relative brought a vial of the substance to the motel's office manager, Suey said. For 12 hours authorities cleaned and cleared the motel room and other potential areas that could have been contaminated, she says.
Seven other people, including the motel manager and some police officers, were taken to local hospitals for examination, but none of them have shown any signs or symptoms of ricin poisoning, Suey says.
The manager had begun an eviction after the sick man didn't pay his bill, suey says.
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