A California mother was nearly strangled to death with a shoelace in a horrific attack outside her Las Vegas hotel room.
Kailee Woods, 27, had traveled to the Nevada city on Sept. 22 to attend an Eagles gig and was staying alone at the Plaza Hotel on Main Street.
The single mother told police she was approached outside the hotel casino by a young man who wanted to borrow her cell phone. She said he later followed her to her room and brutally attacked her in the hallway.
Her sister Kristal Miller, 29, told DailyMail.com exclusively that Woods suffered a severe brain injury from lack of oxygen and was only alive because two men rushed outside to help her after hearing the commotion. She also shared gruesome photos of Woods’ injuries and the crime scene at the hotel.
The suspect was later identified as Antonio Cortez Hernandez, 21. He appeared in court Wednesday after being charged with attempted murder, assault by strangulation and assault with a deadly weapon.
His charges were referred to the district court for a custody hearing, a district court clerk told factstimes . He is due back in court on November 15, where he will be evaluated by a doctor to see if he is mentally fit to stand trial.
He is currently being held in the Clark County Detention Center on $500,000 bail.
Kailee Woods, 27, is pictured with her young son as she graduates from nursing school. Before the terrifying attack, she worked as a home health aide
A black lace on the floor of the hotel where Woods told police she was attacked
Woods told police she was standing outside the hotel smoking with another man she had met that night when her attacker first approached her.
She said he claimed he had been separated from his friends and his cell phone had run out of battery, so he had to borrow a phone to ask a family member to pick him up.
Miller told DailyMail.com her sister said he reminded her of their younger brother, was smartly dressed and very polite, so she wanted to help.
Woods then asked for her phone back and told the man she was going to her room.
But after taking the elevator to the 11th floor, she said the man appeared out of nowhere in the empty hallway outside her room.
She was going to sleep because it was around 3:30 a.m. and was shocked that he had found her. She became annoyed when he asked if she could use her phone again.
Her sister told DailyMail.com that she told him that “you can’t follow people into their rooms” — and that she told him to go to the lobby for help.
“My sister never gave her floor number and she didn’t know his name,” Miller said.
He reportedly claimed he needed the numbers he had called from her phone, so she told him to step back and get him some paper and a pen.
Unable to find it, she tore a page out of a book she was reading and grabbed an eyeliner from her makeup bag.
The strangulation marks around Wood’s neck, taken while she was in the hospital after the near-fatal attack that occurred last month at the Plaza hotel
Kailee Woods, 27 (right) pictured with her older sister Kristal Miller, 29
She told police she then noticed he was holding a black shoelace in his hands that hadn’t been there before.
Miller recalled her sister describing a “strange feeling” and knowing something was wrong.
She said he then asked her to help him write down the numbers for him, which she began to do in the hopes that he would leave.
She claims he then became angry and tried to grab her, so she threw the paper on the floor and ran down the hallway yelling, “Get off me.”
Her sister told DailyMail.com a struggle ensued and he put the shoelace around her neck and squeezed it tightly until she fell unconscious to the floor.
Miller said her sister wasn’t sure how long she was gone, but when she woke up she began screaming and kicking a nearby door as he continued to choke her.
Eventually, two men in the room closest to the attack opened the door and found the victim lying unconscious on the floor.
The attacker fled and the men were unable to catch him. But a black shoelace and a mysterious orange band were found discarded in the hallway.
The men called police, and an ambulance took Woods to University Medical Center, where she was placed in intensive care.
Miller said her sister suffered brain damage and that doctors told her that if the attack had lasted even a few more seconds, she likely would have died.
A photo of the hallway in the Plaza Hotel where the attack took place
Woods described giving her attacker eyeliner and ripping out a page from the book she was reading to write down things just before the attack.
According to the police report, Hernandez was arrested two weeks later, on Oct. 5.
He was charged with assault by strangulation, attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon. He is being held on $500,000 bail at the Clark County Jail.
Miller said her sister was initially summoned to Wednesday’s hearing, but the district attorney’s office told her it had been postponed.
Detective Dorethea Brewer of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department told DailyMail.com she could not provide further details about the case because it is an ongoing investigation.
Megan McCarthy of the LVMPD Public Records Division said that under a new ruling by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that went into effect last month, photos from ongoing cases cannot be released.
Hernandez was also charged with theft for an unrelated incident. He appeared in court Monday for a preliminary hearing.
Miller alleged that hotel security initially misreported the attack as a possible one-night stand gone wrong.
“The head of security said it was domestic violence after she got into an argument with a romantic partner, but that’s not what happened,” she continued.
“They have video footage and everything confirms that this was a random stranger. He was never in her room and they didn’t take the same elevator or go upstairs together. That upset us. They didn’t take it seriously.”
Miller added: “The attack was so brutal. He did it in the open. We don’t understand how he got in the elevator without a room key.” The family said they plan to file a lawsuit against the hotel.
DailyMail.com has contacted the hotel for comment.
The Plaza Hotel & Casino at Freemont is located on the Vegas Strip on N. Main Street
Woods is recovering at home as the scars on her neck heal
Another corner of the hallway at The Plaza Hotel & Casino where the elevators are located
Miller explained that her sister was originally supposed to travel to Vegas with a friend, but she couldn’t go at the last minute.
She added that she didn’t go herself because she had just had a baby, but described her sister as very “independent.”
The concert was on Sept. 20 and the attack occurred two days later.
Miller said Woods, a single mother of a 7-year-old son, is traumatized and has struggled with anxiety and PTSD since the attack.
She added that Woods worked as a home health aide, but is now terrified of being alone in a stranger’s home.
Miller said the ordeal has left her “sick to the stomach.”
“We believe that what he did showed premeditation and that he left his home that night with the intent and plan to harm a stranger. We hope he gets a long prison sentence.” She added: “I hope her story will help other women be careful and not make the same mistakes my sister made, which made her an easy target.”
The Plaza Hotel is one of the largest properties in downtown Las Vegas. Since its construction in 1971, it has been featured in a number of films, television productions and music videos.
The hotel is 22 stories high, has 504 rooms and a 6,000-square-foot casino, according to the company’s media kit.