The innkeeper at a Morrison bed and breakfast may have had a close call Thursday morning when a man suspected in a kidnapping and the death of 73-year-old Denver man stopped by her inn.
Surveillance video shows William Lornes, 24, at the Arrowhead Manor Inn & Event Center near U.S. Highway 285 in Morrison.
The inn is near the area where police found an abandoned car matching the one Lornes allegedly stole after kidnapping a woman at the Cherry Creek Shopping Center on Wednesday afternoon.
Lornes is also accused of killing Gerald Schwartzman, whose body was found in a trash bin in an alley between Grape and Hudson streets Wednesday night.
Innkeeper Marguerite Herb said a man matching Lornes description rang the doorbell at 2 a.m. Thursday. Herb spoke with the man via an intercom security system that allowed her to talk with the man while watching him on a screen.
The system was installed two months ago.
Herb said that the man seemed calm and she offered to call him a cab or help him get a room at a hotel further down the road.
“He didn’t look like a bad guy,” Herb said. “I didn’t have a super bad feeling.”
Herb said she did not let the man in because she was concerned about sending her 24-year-old son up alone as well as disturbing guests at the inn.
Instead, she called the man a cab.
Lornes was arrested after a deputy spotted him riding in a cab. Deputies and Colorado State Patrol arrested Lornes after they pulled the cab over.
“After talking to the man I just didn’t feel like he was this violent criminal,” Herb said. “I feel really bad about putting a taxi driver in that situation. That to me was the worst part of the whole thing.”
Jordan Steffen: 303-945-1794 or jsteffen@denverpost.com
