Woman Dies in Hotel CEO's Vegas Apartment

Oct. 11, 2007 — -- The family of a 24-year-old Denver woman who flew to Las Vegas in August to spend time with a prominent hotel chain CEO and ended up dead from a mysterious drug overdose is demanding answers about what happened.

The woman, Michelle Hatchel, called and text-messaged friends to say she was scared and hiding in a closet after the man's angry ex-girlfriend showed up, her family says.

"She told them she was afraid,'' her grandmother, Helen Barker, told ABC News. By night, she was dead.

The friends reported that they lost contact with Hatchel around 3 a.m. Aug. 29. By 6 a.m. they were trying to reach her again, but the phone went straight to voice mail, Barker said..

Around 8 p.m. the next evening, the CEO, Walter Edward Scheetz, called 911 to report that he'd come home from work and found Hatchel, whom he called "my girlfriend,'' dead in bed, according to Las Vegas Metro police. Listen to 911 Call

The Clark County Coroner's office reported that the woman died of an "acute'' overdose of cocaine and the painkiller oxycodone.

But questions continue to swirl around what exactly happened that August evening in the Turnberry Towers condominium apartment at 2777 Paradise Road.

Brandy Bergman, who works for the financial media relations firm Sard Verbinnen, returned a call placed by ABC News to Scheetz's Greenwich, Conn., home. Bergman said she represented Scheetz and that while she was aware of the family's questions about the final hours of Hatchel's life, she could not comment further. She said Scheetz was not available.

Police who arrived at the scene reportedly found pills and powder near her body, and initially thought Hatchel had committed suicide, according to a police spokesman, who said detectives on the scene eventually decided to turn the case over to the county coroner. But no police report or incident report was ever filed and no investigation undertaken, according to Las Vegas Metro Police spokesman Jose Montoya.

The coroner who examined the body declared Hatchel dead at 10 p.m. Aug. 30 but didn't list an estimated time of death on her report, Hatchel's family said, making it difficult for her family to retrace her final steps.