Another Tourist Reported Dead In The Dominican Republic

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

A 53-year-old woman celebrating her birthday in Punta Cana has become one more North American tourist who is reported deceased when visiting the Dominican Republic in recent months.

Leyla Cox, a radiologist based in Staten Island, New York, died on June 11 while staying at the Excellence resort hotel in Punta Cana, her son, Will Cox, confirmed to NBC and other media.

The young man explained that his mother traveled to that country on June 5 to celebrate his birthday, on June 10. Cox indicated that his mother died the day after celebrating his birthday and that he was simply informed that he had had a sudden heart attack. According to him, a person attached to the United States Embassy in the Dominican Republic informed him that they could not perform an autopsy on his mother because the necessary "machines" were "broken."

The boy, before his mother traveled, warned him about the increasing reports of deaths in hotels in the Caribbean country and tried to persuade her not to travel, but that he did not succeed.

"She was not at risk for a heart attack and I really suspect that the Dominican Republic is somehow responsible for my mother's death," the boy told Nightly News. "If she had gone anywhere else in the world today she would be alive."

According to the said source, Lesley Cox had previously stayed at the mentioned hotel. The Excellence resort has yet to comment on this.

The report appears a few days after Barbara Corcoran, one of the famous hosts of the Shark Tank (CNBC) show, revealed that her brother died a few weeks ago in a hotel in Punta Cana. With this, at least 6 American tourists are already adding They have died in hotels in Punta Cana and La Romana in recent months.

According to reports from The New York Times, in 2018 two more tourists died in two of the hotels where the recent deaths occurred: Yvette Monique Sport, 51, who died after drinking a drink from the minibar at the Bahía Príncipe hotel in La Romana. And David Harrison, 45, who died at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana, where another tourist from California died last April.

For its part, the New York Post reported that the FBi has joined efforts to clarify the deaths and will take blood samples from the deceased to their laboratories in Quantico, Virginia, to be analyzed, a source told the newspaper. According to YahooNews.com this would be the eighth death of a US citizen in said lands.

"Dominican authorities have requested the assistance of the FBI for an additional toxicology analysis in the recent cases of Bahía Príncipe, La Romana and our colleagues at the FBI tell us that these results can take up to 30 days," said spokesmen for the United States Embassy in the Dominican Republic through a statement. "We ask everyone to be patient as these investigations continue."