Chicago: As if the case could get any stranger, court documents in the lawsuit of an Air India pilot say the woman who robbed him in 2013 at what is now the Wyndham Grand Riverfront Hotel was actually a man dressed as a woman.
On a two-day layover in Chicago on April 15, 2013, before flying a Boeing 777 back to Delhi, where he lived, Pankul Mathur says he was awakened at 10:40 p.m. by a “loud banging” on his door. When he opened the door, without looking through the peephole or asking who was there, what he originally thought was a large African-American woman barged in and took $500 from his wallet next to the bed.
“I ran to the phone to pick up the phone and to call to the security,” said Mathur (right) in a March 17, 2015, deposition, only recently made public, “at which point she yanked the cable off from the base unit and I was just left with the handset in my hand, at which point I just ran out of the room yelling at the top of my voice, saying ‘Help me. I’m being robbed.’” Pankul Mathur
But the hotel, he says, starting with a housekeeper named Anthony Downs who was standing outside his door, ignored his pleas.
The robber got away that night but was caught on security video. Chicago police watched the video and within a week made an arrest – of a man who went by the name Audrey James. James had been arrested twice before for prostitution. He told police he was a massage therapist and that Mathur had contacted him through a website, which Mathur denies.
The charges, this time, did not stick. Police say Mathur never showed up to identify James as the robber. Mathur says police never told him they had made an arrest, only that they had someone who fit the description.
Judge unsure if case can continue in federal court
Mathur is suing Hospitality Properties Trust, owner of the hotel, and the hotel’s operator, Wyndham Hotel Management.
On February 10, 2016, Judge Sharon Coleman dismissed two of three counts in the lawsuit, filed in United States District Court. One count, for negligence, survives but Mathur cannot recover punitive damages – money that goes beyond compensation and is intended to punish the defendant.
24/02/16 Steven Dahlman/Loop North News
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On a two-day layover in Chicago on April 15, 2013, before flying a Boeing 777 back to Delhi, where he lived, Pankul Mathur says he was awakened at 10:40 p.m. by a “loud banging” on his door. When he opened the door, without looking through the peephole or asking who was there, what he originally thought was a large African-American woman barged in and took $500 from his wallet next to the bed.
“I ran to the phone to pick up the phone and to call to the security,” said Mathur (right) in a March 17, 2015, deposition, only recently made public, “at which point she yanked the cable off from the base unit and I was just left with the handset in my hand, at which point I just ran out of the room yelling at the top of my voice, saying ‘Help me. I’m being robbed.’” Pankul Mathur
But the hotel, he says, starting with a housekeeper named Anthony Downs who was standing outside his door, ignored his pleas.
The robber got away that night but was caught on security video. Chicago police watched the video and within a week made an arrest – of a man who went by the name Audrey James. James had been arrested twice before for prostitution. He told police he was a massage therapist and that Mathur had contacted him through a website, which Mathur denies.
The charges, this time, did not stick. Police say Mathur never showed up to identify James as the robber. Mathur says police never told him they had made an arrest, only that they had someone who fit the description.
Judge unsure if case can continue in federal court
Mathur is suing Hospitality Properties Trust, owner of the hotel, and the hotel’s operator, Wyndham Hotel Management.
On February 10, 2016, Judge Sharon Coleman dismissed two of three counts in the lawsuit, filed in United States District Court. One count, for negligence, survives but Mathur cannot recover punitive damages – money that goes beyond compensation and is intended to punish the defendant.
24/02/16 Steven Dahlman/Loop North News
