3 Americans Die in Same Dominican Hotel Within Days of Each Other

Stock photo of an ambulance. Michael Gil via Wikimedia Commons

A 41-year-old woman from Pennsylvania died in at the Bahia Principe resort in the Dominican Republic last month, which was just five days before a Maryland couple was found dead at the same place.

Miranda Schaup-Werner, of Allentown, collapsed and died in her hotel room, Fox News reported. The 41-year-old had just checked in with her husband, Daniel Werner, as they were celebrating their wedding anniversary.

“Daniel and all of us are in a state of disbelief, we are shocked. She was perfectly content, everything seemed fine,” Jay McDonald, Daniel’s brother-in-law, told Fox. “It was, at first, a little confusing that there was such a strong parallel… it immediately caused serious concern for us.”

McDonald said that the Werners were planning to spend five days in the Caribbean country.

“They enjoyed vacationing in that part of the world, in the Caribbean,” he told the broadcaster. “They arrived on May 25 on Saturday. They really seemed to enjoy the place. If you see the photos [on Facebook] and the way they were presented, clearly they were very happy to be there.”

But as they were inside their hotel room, Miranda “decided to relax with a drink from the minibar” and mixed soda with alcohol, said McDonald. An hour later, she began experiencing health problems.

“Suddenly, she called out to Dan and he came right over and she was unable to breathe. She collapsed, she couldn’t communicate,” he told Fox. “He did his best to try and resuscitate, to help her.”

Her husband tried to perform CPR before paramedics arrived on the scene. When they did, they attempted to administer an epinephrine injection, which are used for allergic reactions. However, she was pronounced dead soon after.

“It was very sudden,” McDonald noted. “[Daniel] said one moment [Miranda was] taking pictures, smiling, happy and the next moment, in extreme pain and collapsing… she had no known health issues that I knew of.”

Days after that, Edward Nathaniel Holmes and Cynthia Ann Day, a couple from Maryland, died in the same resort. Officials later said they died of respiratory failure.

According to CNN, citing an autopsy report, officials said they died of respiratory failure and pulmonary edema, which is caused by excess fluid in the lungs.

They were found unresponsive in their room, hotel officials said.

“We are deeply saddened by the incident at one of our hotels in La Romana, Dominican Republic, and want to express our deepest condolences to their family and friends,” the statement from the hotel read, according to USA Today. “The staff immediately contacted the relevant local authorities which have initiated an investigation.”

Police said that their bodies showed there were no signs of violence, and several bottles of medicine to treat high blood pressure were found in their room, according to CNN.

Sonya Jackson, Cynthia’s sister, told NBC Washington that the two were engaged.

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Dajuan Holmes-Hamilton, Nathaniel Holmes’ daughter, said she wants to know why they died.

“It should have never happened,” she told the news outlet.

Of their deaths, “That was beyond coincidence,” McDonald told Fox. He suggested that Werner’s cause of death was also respiratory failure.

He said, “They died five days after, and the cause was determined to be the same, this just puts this whole thing through the stratosphere—something is going on, and we want to know what it is.”