Dubai: It’s the screams that disturb Hassan Mohammad the most.
The 28-year-old Emirati businessman was on his first trip to London when he was woken by piercing screams in the corridor on the seventh floor of the luxury Cumberland Hotel.
“I heard horrific screaming,” Mohammad said. “The woman was desperate she was shouting ‘I regret coming here, they are bleeding. My sister is bleeding from the head, please help’.”
Just moments earlier, three Emirati women were attacked in their adjoining hotel room by a man with a hammer. He beat Kholoud, a 36-year-old woman so severely that she is now in a critical condition in a London hospital. Doctors trying to save her life have placed her in a medically-induced coma to try and reduce the swelling on her brain.
Her companions, Uhoud, 34, and Fatima, 31, were also beaten about the face by the attacker and are also in serious condition.
“Everybody in the UAE is talking about this terrible attack,” Mohammad said, “We are all in shock. I will never forget those screams.”
Everything seemed normal early on Sunday morning in the 1,019-room, four-star hotel opposite Marble Arch at the edge of Hyde Park. It’s close to Oxford Street, the busiest shopping district in Europe. London Metropolitan Police think that the cold-blooded attacker had either selected his victims earlier on Saturday as they shopped — or was disturbed by his three victims as he burgled their room. In an adjoining room, three children slept along with a 16-year-old brother and an 18-year-old sister of the victims,
Now, the rooms are sealed off by forensic specialists trying to find any clue to track down the attacker.
‘Unusually violent attack’
“This was an unusually violent attack on three women and I am very keen to speak with anyone who was in or around the hotel between 1am and 2am on Sunday morning,” Detective Chief Inspector Andy Chalmers, of Scotland Yard’s homicide and major crime command, told Gulf News in an emailed statement.
The attacker left his weapon behind as he fled the scene.
Scotland Yard is trawling through hours of CCTV footage from cameras in the hotel, a late-night store opposite the hotel, on adjoining streets and on Hyde Park and Park Lane in a bid to find the hammer man. The London Underground tube station at Marble Arch has an extensive network of security cameras as well.
Within minutes, London Ambulance Service staff were on the scene and were treating the women. The attack was so intense and violent that Scotland Yard is treating the incident as attempted murder.
The bobbies also say that there were no signs of forced entry at the hotel room. At least two security guards were on duty at the Cumberland, where rooms typically cost Dh1,000 per night or up to Dh2,400 for the Jimi Hendrix suite, named after the hard rock guitarist who liked to stay at the central London landmark. He gave his last interview there before his death in 1970.
The UAE Embassy in London told Gulf News that they were aware of the incident but were not commenting further.
A spokesman for the Cumberland Hotel said that the main priority was helping police with their inquiries and doing everything they can now to assist the victims of the attack and their families.
He said that everyone was “shocked” at the attack and nothing like this had happened at the hotel before.
— With inputs from Samir Salama, Associate Editor, and agencies.
