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Speaking out for the first time, wife of California lawyer who died in Mexico recalls his final hours

 
Elliot Blair was celebrating his one-year wedding anniversary when he died in Rosarito, Mexico, on Saturday, Jan. 14, 2023. (Family GoFundMe page)

Elliot Blair was celebrating his first wedding anniversary when he died in Rosarito, Mexico, on Saturday, Jan. 14, 2023. (Family GoFundMe page)

The wife of a California lawyer who believes her husband was killed while she slept in their room at a resort in Rosarito last month recounted the final hours before he died in what Mexican authorities said was an accidental fall from a balcony.

In an interview with ABC’s Good Morning America, Kim Williams spoke out for the first time since her husband, Elliot Blair, a 33-year-old public defender in Orange County, Calif., was found dead early Jan. 14.

She and her husband had spent the day celebrating their first wedding anniversary and went to bed around midnight. The next thing she knew, a hotel manager and security guard at Las Rocas Resort & Spa woke her up.

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“They’re saying, ‘Excuse me, miss. Excuse me. Excuse me,” Williams said in the interview. “Is this your boyfriend down here?

She ran out, and they pointed to the ground.

“That was my Elliot down there,” she said. “I just was yelling at them to call an ambulance, call an ambulance, call an ambulance. They said an ambulance came an hour ago.”

She said was given multiple versions of what happened.

“Accident, suicide, gunshot wound. It was a roller coaster,” she said. “Everything under the sun, except for what I think happened. Someone did this to him.”

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She recounted the hours before her husband’s death.

She said the two had woken up late, had gotten massages, had margaritas while watching the sunset, had dinner, and then danced.

She said on the way back to the room, Rosarito police pulled them over for rolling through a stop sign and demanded a bribe, but they didn’t have the amount the officers wanted between the two of them.

“Elliot has always told me when we go down there to kind of not engage,” Williams said. “He’ll handle whatever needs to be said with them.”

She said Blair told an officer they didn’t have the amount of cash that they wanted, then another officer approached and asked, “You know, where are you staying?”

She said Blair told the officer where they were staying and that they were on vacation.

“Elliot kind of stood his ground, showed him his work badge, and said, ‘Look, we’re attorneys,'” she said. “We’re not down here to mess around, but we’re also not going to be taken advantage of.”

They paid the officers $160 before they were let go, Williams said.

“We were both rattled, but at the same time, we both had this feeling of, ‘Thank God, they didn’t do anything more to us.'”

Williams, certain that her husband was targeted, has hired an attorney and private investigators.

“I just know it’s not an accident. I know he didn’t fall. I just know that,” she told ABC News. “I want to do everything we can to figure out what happened in that 45-minute, hour time span. Because that’s what Elliot deserves. And that’s the hardest part for me, is not knowing.”

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