SC orders Shangri-La to pay murdered guest’s heirs P52 million in damages

(Updated Sept. 19, 9:40 a.m.) - The Supreme Court ordered the Makati Shangri-La Hotel and Resort, Inc. to pay about P52 million in damages to the heirs of a murdered hotel guest. 

 

The High Court First Division decision upheld a Regional Trial Court and a Court of Appeals ruling that said the Shangri-La failed to provide basic and adequate security measures expected of a five-star hotel, and that its omission was the proximate cause of Norwegian guest's, Christian Fredrik Harper's, death. Harper was murdered inside the hotel’s premises on November 6, 1999.

 

“The hotel owner is liable for civil damages to the surviving heirs of its hotel guest whom strangers murder inside his hotel room,” the High Court said in a 29-page decision penned by Associate Justice Lucas P. Bersamin.

 

“The hotel business is imbued with public interest. Catering to the public, hotelkeepers are bound to provide not only lodging for their guests but also security to the persons and belongings of their guests,” the decision read.

 

The SC decision upheld a CA ruling that ordered the Shangri-La to pay Harper’s heirs P52,078,702.50 as actual and compensatory damages, P25,000 as temperate damages, P250,000 as attorney’s fees, and to pay the costs of the suit.

 

Harper came to Manila on a business trip in the first week of November 1999. He was murdered by still unidentified killers on the morning that he was scheduled to leave the hotel. "As of Tuesday, September 18, Makati Shangri-La has not received the decision from the Supreme Court on the Harper Case, an incident that happened in November of 1999. Therefore, the hotel is not in the position to comment at this time," Erica Sotto, the hotel's director of communications, said in a press statement. — With a report from Amita O. Legaspi/DVM/KG, GMA News