A motel in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, known to travelers for being “disgusting” and “very nasty” allegedly allowed customers and employees to sell drugs and engage in prostitution for several years, according to court documents filed earlier this week.
The Coral Sands motel in Horry County is being sued by law enforcement after an investigation, The Myrtle Beach Sun News reported Saturday.
The probe, which first began in 2018 by Myrtle Beach police, found that management and security workers at the motel frequently purchased drugs from customers and provided cheaper rooms for individuals selling illegal substances or providing sex services. The lawsuit also alleged that management accepted bribes in exchange for allowing people to sell drugs, and even had a room set aside for both drug use and prostitution.
Horry County prosecutor Jimmy Richardson is now seeking for the Ocean Boulevard establishment be temporarily closed for at least a year, the Sun News reported.
According to the lawsuit, Myrtle Beach police officers and city officials had previously met with the motel’s owner, Harkishin Bhambhani, and management in order to address “dilapidated conditions and its high calls for service.”
However, the lawsuit stated that despite those meetings, “the Coral Sands’ nuisance activity remained unabated,” according to the Sun News. Additional court documents said the motel received a notice of public nuisance on June 7 and did not respond within the 10-day limit, the news outlet reported.
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Furthermore, customer reviews on several travel websites showed that the motel has been known to be riddled with cockroaches and filthy rooms. The Coral Sands motel frequently received just one-star ratings, with many noting that the motel felt unsafe, dirty, and full of pests.
Others stated that the motel had bedbugs and did not appear to be up to code.
“This is the most disgusting place I have ever been. The hotel was unclean, bugs everywhere & not up to code. The room was unclean. Cig butt left on the widow seal, bathroom was disgusting, bugs EVERYWHERE – when you turned the lights off at night roaches would start running around all over everything. The roof was caving in in several places in the bathroom, the trash can smelled like it had never been cleaned & after sleeping in the bed I woke up itchy & covered in small bites,” one customer wrote last year, according to a review on the Better Business Bureau website.