LEGAL DOCUMENTS: America's Got Talent Contestant Joe Finley Suing Hotel for Wrongful Death
May 28 2018, Updated 10:15 a.m. ET
Former America's Got Talent contestant Joe Finley is suing the swanky LA hotel where his wife was murdered last year because he claims a security breach let a homeless man sneak in resulting in her death, and RadarOnline.com has the legal papers.
The wrongful death lawsuit, which was filed on Wednesday with the Superior Court of California in Los Angeles, claims the Millenium Biltmore Hotel was negligent on the night his wife, Laura, was murdered because their lapse security policy allowed vagrants to wander in unattended.
LEGAL DOCUMENTS: Joe Finley Files Wrongful Death Suit Against Hotel
The luxury hotel was being remodeled on the night of October 22, 2010, when Joe and Laura Finley checked in before Joe’s reality show audition, and the legal complaint claims that staff didn't take adequate security measures to ensure that non-guests or transients couldn't enter the premises.
The papers state that the first and second floors were unsecured and there had been prior violent crimes, along with signs of homeless people including empty food containers, open alcohol bottles, filthy clothes, bottles of urine and cigarette butts scattering the corridors.
"More telling, the door which led to the street was propped open by a piece of brick that was tied to that door with a shoestring," states the lawsuit.
Homeless people had been spotted eating food from room service trays and followed guests to their rooms, and Finley claims there were past assaults with weapons, theft and acts of violence.
Laura Finley's body was found in a stairwell of the hotel in downtown Los Angeles where the America's Got Talent auditions were being held. Her late husband is now suing for unspecified damages.
No one has been charged in connection with the murder and high-level police sources have insisted Laura's death was not at all suspicious, although the cause of death has never been declared an accident, homicide or suicide.
AUDIO: America's Got Talent Death -- The 911 Call
Shortly after Laura’s death Joe was named a “person of interest” in the investigation, and was interrogated, but never charged.