Model dies in fall from hotel window

ATLANTA – A model celebrating her birthday died and another woman was critically injured when they plunged from a 10th-story window of a luxury Atlanta hotel early Saturday morning, investigators said.

Witnesses told police that 30-year-old LaShawna Threatt and a second woman were “play wrestling” in a room at the W Midtown Hotel around 3:15 a.m. when they crashed into a window and fell four or five stories onto a slanted glass ceiling above a sunroom.

Rescuers found Threatt, the mother of a 15-year-old daughter, dead on the sunroom roof.

The second woman tumbled off that same roof and fell onto an outdoor patio outside the hotel. She was taken to Grady Hospital with multiple broken bones and other injuries and listed in critical condition. Friends say Threatt was the best friend of the injured woman.

“According to the witnesses, there was no arguing during the hours leading up to this, either, so it’s really a tragic accident,” said Lt. Paul Guerrucci, commander of the Atlanta Police Department’s homicide unit.

Threatt worked as a model, doing liquor promotions and appearing in print ads. She started celebrating her birthday Friday by eating with friends at a restaurant, then went to the hotel room for an after party, said Jomarys Castillo, 24, a friend who attended the dinner but left before the hotel party.