Ottawa woman badly beaten at Mexican resort

Ottawa woman badly beaten in Mexico Lexie York, 29, recovering in Cancun after a vicious beating in her hotel room. CTV's Catherine Lathem reports.

OTTAWA - Family and friends of an Ottawa woman are rallying around her after she was seriously beaten at a Mexican vacation resort.

Lexie York, 29, arrived at the Grand Bahia Principe Tulum resort in the afternoon of Sunday, Nov. 10 for the start of what was supposed to be a mother-daughter vacation.  Lexie, a flight attendant, found a price she couldn’t turn down so arrived to the resort the day before her mother.  When she got there, her brother Mathew says Lexie’s room wasn’t ready so she headed straight to the pool for some sun.  When her room was finally ready that afternoon she headed back for a nap.

“She woke up late and was hungry so I guess she went down (to the lobby) about 2am to get a snack,” Mathew told CTV News from his Cancun hotel room. “She ran into some people she had spoken to at the pool and they invited her to eat with them.”

Mathew says those people were two couples, husbands and wives, who she had met earlier that day around the pool.  He says Lexie, a seasoned traveler, felt safe enough to sit with them and chat.  When it was time to head back to her room, one of the couples walked her back and dropped her at her door.  Mathew says it was about an hour later when Lexie heard a knock on her door. It was the “other man”, the one who didn’t walk her back, who was there.  The man claimed his wife told him she had a heard a scream so he came to check on Lexie.  Mathew says Lexie told the man she was fine, thanked him for his concern and asked him to leave, but that’s when he barged in.

“Once he got into the room he started strangling her and then beating her,” Mathew says.

Mathew says his sister was knocked unconscious, and when she finally regained consciousness, she couldn’t see but managed to find her way out of her room and crawl down the hall begging for help.  Other guests helped her, calling an ambulance and police.

Mathew says police found the suspect in her room passed out.  Mathew says police have told him Mexico City native, Ricardo Sanchez Pichardo, has been charged with attempted murder.

Mathew and his parents are now in Cancun to be by Lexie’s side while she is in hospital with severe injuries.

“She went through about nine or ten hours of plastic surgery,” Mathew says. “She now has a metal plate in her cheek and she had mesh put under her eyes to bring her muscle up to where it ought to be.  She can’t quite see, one eye is blurry and the other is double vision.”

Global Affairs Canada spokesperson, Angela Savard, tells CTV News “Our thoughts are with the Canadian who sustained injuries in Mexico. Consular officials are providing consular services and are in contact with local authorities to gather additional information. Due to the provisions under the Privacy Act, no further information can be disclosed.”

It could be weeks before Lexie is well enough to return to Ottawa.  Friends and Family have set up a GoFundMe page to help in her recovery.