Hawthorn Suites is a hotel brand owned by the Wyndham company and marketed as offering “a welcoming atmosphere that’s perfect for extended stays.” Unfortunately, like most hospitality brands, Hawthorn Suites hotels haven’t always provided the safe haven that people need from a hotel, let alone from longer-term accommodations.
Below, we’ll go over common reasons you might need to sue Hawthorn Suites, the challenges involved, and how we can help. If at any point you’d rather speak directly with a lawyer, feel free to reach out by phone or chat.
Wyndham’s Franchise Structure Makes the Company Difficult, but Not Impossible, to Sue
Although Wyndham owns the Hawthorn Suites brand and many others, it doesn’t actually own the hotels operating under those brands. Instead, smaller regional companies each own one or a few individual hotels. These smaller companies manage the hotels’ day-to-day operations while paying the Wyndham company for the use of a recognizable brand.
Wyndham has the right to establish and enforce quality standards for its franchisees, but it has no legal obligation to do so.
This business structure creates a great deal of legal separation between the Wyndham company and the actual hotels that generate its income. Usually, when someone gets hurt at a negligently managed Wyndham hotel, it’s the local owner, rather than Wyndham, that can be held liable in court.
There are situations, however, in which courts are willing to hold big franchisors responsible. For example, if Wyndham’s brand standards for Hawthorn Suites made you less safe instead of more, or if Wyndham profited from putting you in harm’s way in such an extreme, obvious manner that it can’t reasonably claim ignorance, you might be able to sue Wyndham for compensation.
Even if Wyndham isn’t liable in your case, it’s important to remember that hotel franchisees usually aren’t small businesses, just smaller than Wyndham. Individual Hawthorn Suites hotels are still multimillion dollar operations that are perfectly capable of fairly compensating an injured guest.
Hotels Are Responsible for Anticipating and Addressing Threats to Guest Safety
If it’s reasonably predictable that something on a hotel’s premises might cause an accident, the hotel’s owner has a duty to take all reasonable steps to stop that accident before it happens.
Some of the most common examples include wet or uneven floors and loose or missing handrails, but more complex architectural features also bring their own potential threats. Fuel-burning appliances and swimming pools, for example, can be particularly deadly if not well managed and cared for.
In July of 2016, employees at the Hawthorn Suites in Warren, Michigan discovered a couple and their dog unconscious in their room, having suffered severe carbon monoxide poisoning from the hotel’s malfunctioning HVAC system. All three survived, but only because they happened to be found in time. Installing carbon monoxide alarms in all guest rooms could have saved this couple and their dog from having to rely on luck, and better HVAC maintenance might have prevented the poisoning altogether.
Five years later, guests at the Hawthorn Suites in Lubbock, Texas discovered a 5-year-old boy unresponsive in the pool. Emergency crews took him to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Few details of the incident were ever released. However, the fact that strangers discovered the boy’s body underwater suggests that either the hotel allowed the boy to swim unsupervised, the water was murky enough for an adult to lose track of him in it, or both.
Fire code compliance is another absolutely essential part of hotel safety. If a hotel isn’t designed for quick fire containment and suppression, or doesn’t have clear, well-lit, and well-marked escape routes, a single incident can kill dozens of people at once.
For extended stay brands like Hawthorn Suites, fires can also destroy guests’ lives in other ways, without racking up any casualty statistics. In November of 2021, an electrical fire caught and spread throughout the Hawthorn Suites in Fort Wayne, Indiana, destroying the building and displacing 22 guests, many of whom had lived there for years and lost everything they had.
If you’ve been harmed by an accident on a Hawthorn Suites property, don’t be fooled into thinking that “accident” is synonymous with “no one’s fault.” Very often, hotel accidents go hand in hand with code violations, ignored warning signs, and deliberate corner-cutting. A lawyer can help you find out if that’s the case for you.
Anticipating Threats to Guest Safety Includes Anticipating the Threat of Violence
There are lots of ways hotels can help keep their guests safer from violent crime, including visible surveillance cameras, good lighting in common areas, ID requirements at check-in, and if necessary, security guard presence.
Exactly what measures are appropriate varies from location to location. Hotels in statistically high-crime areas, and those with a history of violence on the property, have a duty to respond by raising security against future incidents.
For example, in the year before it burned down, the Hawthorn Suites in Fort Wayne had at least two incidents involving armed criminals.
First, in January, a man was shot and killed in one of the rooms. Witnesses say the shooter and victim got into an argument over something the victim posted on Facebook. Then, in May, three armed intruders successfully robbed the hotel.
If it had existed for longer, that location would have needed to make serious security upgrades. Otherwise, it would be liable for the outcome of future incidents.
Of course, Hawthorn Suite’s problems with gun violence didn’t end with the destruction of the Fort Wayne location. Within the last six months alone, there have been at least two shootings inside Hawthorn Suites hotels.
In February, a man staying at the Hawthorn Suites in Midwest City, Oklahoma was shot in the head. Incredibly, with surgery, he was able to survive.
Then, on July 12th, two men on a motorcycle road trip together got into an argument in their room at the Hawthorn Suites in Erie, Pennsylvania. One of them reportedly drew a gun, and shot his companion through the hand when he tried to wrestle it away from him.
Aside from the harm to the intended victims, shootings at hotels always carry a high risk of harm to bystanders. The plaster of the walls that separate guest rooms does very little to reduce the lethality of bullets, so it’s entirely possible for a guest to be injured or killed without knowing, or even seeing, the shooter.
If you’ve been harmed by violence at a Hawthorn Suites, talk with a lawyer about the hotel’s history and security standards, to see if you have a negligent security case.
Hotels Have a Particular Responsibility to Watch for Signs of Sex Trafficking
All business owners have a responsibility to refuse to profit off of sex trafficking, but few types of businesses will encounter this issue as regularly as hotels. Most sex traffickers rely on temporary private venues, like hotel rooms, to confine and sell victims. Because of how prevalent this practice is, every hotel needs to be prepared to respond to sex trafficking appropriately, with the aim of protecting victims from further harm.
Unfortunately, many hotels still welcome the opportunity to have sex traffickers as repeat customers, and will choose to assist them over their victims.
Hawthorn Suites has had its share of incidents.
In 2017, in El Paso, Texas, a man pled guilty to sex trafficking three victims, at least one of them underage. The plea deal allowed him to avoid several other charges, including three further counts of child sex trafficking spanning from 2013 to 2015. One of the victims reported that he’d taken her to the Hawthorn Suites near the El Paso airport immediately upon recruiting her.
Later, in 2022, a woman brough a suit against the Wyndham company, stating that she had been sex trafficked out of a Hawthorn Suites and a Super 8 motel — both Wyndham brands — in Columbus, Ohio from 2009 through 2015. In her complaint, she described large numbers of nonpaying male guests openly asking for her at the front desk and then leaving within hours, as well as her main trafficker asking the front desk to notify him if she tried to leave the premises. Apparently, no one working at either hotel called the police. Wyndham moved to have the case against it dismissed, based on its role as a franchisor, but was denied.
That same year, a woman reported that a man living at a Hawthorn Suites in Manchester, Connecticut had been trafficking her and approximately 15 other women, using both that location and a nearby Days Inn (also a Wyndham brand) as venues. She went on to describe common sex trafficking tactics he allegedly used, including verbal and physical abuse and forced substance dependance.
If you’ve also been sexually exploited at a Hawthorn Suites, there’s a very good chance you can collect compensation from Wyndham, the local hotel owner, or both.
What to Do If You’ve Been Harmed at a Hawthorn Suites
If you’ve been involved in an accident or violent altercation at a Hawthorn Suites, it’s worth checking in with a lawyer about your rights, no matter what has happened between then and now. That said, the way you respond in the seconds and weeks after an incident can greatly affect your chances of collecting compensation. If your incident was recent, try to follow these steps as closely as you can:
- Protect yourself from further harm. If you’re in a burning building or a hostage situation, escaping alive should be your top priority.
- Protect the evidence. As long as it doesn’t require you to compromise your health or safety, begin collecting evidence as soon as possible. Take pictures of the incident site, and hold on to anything that can prove where you were, how you were hurt, or what you lost. If there are any witnesses to what happened, ask if they’d be willing to provide their contact information.
- Seek medical care. Sometimes, allowing yourself to be loaded into an ambulance is the first and only thing you can do on the day of an accident or attack. If that’s the case, don’t worry. You and your lawyer can play catch-up later on gathering evidence. On the other hand, if you are able to walk away from the incident to take pictures or contact witnesses, be sure not to delay medical care for too long. Timely records of your condition are often the best evidence you can have.
- Report the incident. If you were the victim of a crime, file a police report and get a copy for yourself. Then, if you feel comfortable doing so, notify the Hawthorn Suites hotel that you were injured on the property. This prevents the hotel from destroying evidence, such as relevant security footage, without legal consequences. It’s important to keep your interaction with Hawthorn Suites brief and general, however, or your words could be used against you.
- Contact a lawyer. The sooner you have legal counsel, the sooner you can begin redirecting communication about the incident through your lawyer’s office, protecting your case and reducing the burden on yourself. It’s important to take the time to pick the right lawyer, however. Ideally, you’ll want to work with someone who has a strong track record with similar cases against franchised businesses.
The Stoddard Firm has experts in franchise law, innkeeper laws, personal injury, wrongful death, premises liability, negligent security, and human trafficking law. We’re passionate about holding powerful companies accountable at the highest possible level, and, above all, helping our clients recover as fully as possible.
We’ll investigate exactly how Hawthorn Suites failed you as a guest, and take a thorough accounting of how the results will impact the rest of your life, so that you get the fullest possible settlement.
To speak with a lawyer about your case today, reach out through our online chat function or at 678-RESULTS for a free consultation.
Attorney Matt Stoddard
Matt Stoddard is a professional, hardworking, ethical advocate. He routinely faces some of the nation’s largest companies and some of the world’s largest insurers – opponents who have virtually unlimited resources. In these circumstances, Mr. Stoddard is comfortable. Mr. Stoddard provides his strongest efforts to his clients, and he devotes the firm’s significant financial resources to presenting the strongest case possible on their behalf. Matt understands that his clients must put their trust in him. That trust creates an obligation for Matt to work tirelessly on their behalf, and Matt Stoddard does not take that obligation lightly. [ Attorney Bio ]
