An Alpharetta family is angry after their 4-year-old child allegedly found a used condom in what they said was an unclean Wyndham Garden Hotel room in downtown Atlanta.
Carmen Jones told the AJC she’s been taking her grandson to the doctor as well as Scottish Rite Hospital almost daily since the incident happened three weeks ago.
Jones said she and her cousin checked into the 175 Piedmont Avenue hotel around 7 p.m. on July 31 after spending the day with their two grandchildren at Six Flags over Georgia. Jones said the hotel room was without soap, cups and enough towels.
Soaked from a late-day summer thunderstorm and too tired to try to change hotel rooms, Jones said she called the front desk for those items, ordered room service and went to sleep.
“When you’ve dealt with a couple of 4-year-olds at Six Flags all day, you’re just beat,” she said.
Plus, she said, the family was focused on their Sunday adventure: a trip to the Georgia Aquarium.
That outing was delayed slightly when her grandson found a used condom in the bed sheets and started playing with it.
Jones asked for management from the hotel to bring mouthwash for her grandson.
She said a manager gave them the room, breakfast and the trip to the aquarium for free. The aquarium trip was included as a part of the hotel package, she said.
The AJC has made several attempts to contact the hotel. Calls and e-mails to Wyndham’s corporate office were not immediately returned.
By the end of their aquarium visit, Jones told the AJC that her grandson became ill. She took him to the doctor the next day, she said. By Friday, Jones said her grandson’s heath had gotten worse, so she took him to Scottish Rite Hospital.
Authorities at Scottish Rite told Jones to file an incident report with the Atlanta Police Department.
No charges have been filed against the hotel, according to the report.
The 4-year-old boy has been tested for HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases, Jones said. She is awaiting the results of the tests.
The family has hired Thomas Jones, a lawyer with Jones & Associates on Cascade Road, to negotiate a settlement with the hotel. Jones has been contacting local media about this story through an e-mailed press release.
He told the AJC he will file a lawsuit against the hotel if out-of-court negotiations are not successful.
“Right now it’s about the child’s health,” he told the AJC. “We can’t even think about a settlement. One of the things is to evaluate the claims, and this may not be evaluated for years and years and years.”
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