Tag: autopsies

Elliot Blair was happily dancing the night away hours before he was mysteriously found face-down dead at a Mexican resort.

A video obtained by The Post shows Blair and his wife, Kimberley Williams, having fun and dancing to a live band at Splash Baja restaurant and bar in Rosarito Beach at about 8:30 p.m. on Jan. 13

They were celebrating their first wedding anniversary before the trip took an ugly turn.

Case Barnett, who represents Blair’s family, told The Post the couple had only been at Rosarito three days and were frequent visitors to the hotel and nearby bars and restaurants. 

The couple, who both worked at the Orange County Public Defender’s Office, made sure to get their favorite room at Las Rocas Resort and Spa — Room 308 — which was on the second floor of the posh hotel.

After enjoying dinner, dancing and karaoke that Friday, the couple went back to the room at about 11:45 p.m. Williams went straight to bed while Blair took a quick shower, according to the family.

About two hours later, Williams was awakened by the sound of frantic hotel employees directing her to her husband’s lifeless body, which had somehow ended up on the ground floor near an open walkway.

“When she gets down to the body, he’s facedown on the ground,” Barnett said. “She screams, ‘Call the cops! Call an ambulance! He needs an ambulance!’ The employees say they were already there, but left because he was already dead.”

The family said Mexican police who responded to the scene after 1:45 a.m. initially told Williams her husband had injuries to his head but later added they also found a bullet hole.

Barnett said a liaison with the coroner’s office contacted the family on Jan. 16 and told them the cause of death was a “trauma to the head” but nothing about a bullet hole. The family has yet to see the coroner’s report or even see Blair’s body, which remains at a mortuary in Rosarito. 

The attorney general of Baja California’s version of events is that Blair fell to his death when he went outside to shoo away pigeons outside his hotel room. Officials said Williams told investigators Blair was annoyed by noisy birds, a claim the family has refuted.

Barnett said Williams told the cops birds would roost near their room and Elliot would jokingly coo at the birds, but it was lost in translation.

“I don’t know if the Mexican cops misinterpreted what Kim said or if they extrapolated it,” Barnett said. “There is just confusion everywhere. She 100% unequivocally did not say he was shooing those birds. It just does not make any sense.”

A man who met the couple at Splash Baja told The Post he struck up a conversation with Blair after he ordered an Old Fashioned cocktail at the bar.

“He started telling me how he makes the Old Fashioned and that’s how the conversation started,” said the restaurant patron, who wanted to remain anonymous. “Elliot said that was his favorite drink. And then I started telling him how I made my drink. The bartender then asked Elliot if he wanted one also, but he said, ‘No, I’m already drinking beer and had a shot of Tequila earlier. I don’t want to mix it.’ That was very good of him. He wasn’t there just to drink.”

Blair’s family have insisted neither he nor his wife were drunk that night, and are not big drinkers. The man said he saw the couple each had a beer and did not appear intoxicated.

Blair’s mother, Stella, had hoped to take possession of her son’s body so an independent toxicology test could be completed, but she was told Wednesday the body had already been embalmed. Authorities reportedly told the family the body had to be embalmed before it is allowed back across the border.

Williams has been left reeling as more questions continue to surface in connection to her husbands death, Barnett told The Post.

The video of Blair and Williams laughing and dancing to the band performing Earth, Wind & Fire’s “Let’s Groove” at the Splash bar serves as a painful and bitter-sweet reminder of the couple’s anniversary celebration.

“They let out a primal scream when Elliot’s mom told them his body was already embalmed,” Barnett said. “It was awful and was nothing like I’ve heard before. There has been so much confusion and all they wanted was to get their own toxicology. I’ve never heard so much pain and screaming. It’s as if Elliot was dead again.

“They specifically were hoping they could clear it and know that he was not drunk. He was not that type of person. And not having a way to know now to clear his name is just devastating.”