The Escazú Municipality closed down on Thursday, December 6, the lodging facility Villa Le Mas located in San Antonio, Escazú, where Carla Stefaniak, the Venezuelan-American tourist who was murdered, stayed.

According to the Municipality, the hotel, owned by a corporation under the name Adiantum had given up the permit to operate as a hotel back in 2013, and apparently was operating without any regulations from the Municipality or the Costa Rican Tourism Board.
Villa Le Mas was operating as an AirBnb and advertised in sites such as TripAdvisor.

AirBnB type rentals or lodging are not currently regulated or supervised by tourism authorities in the country. The AirBnB platform has been operating since 2011 in the country and has stated its willingness to pay taxes. There are close to 9 thousand properties in the country available in AirBnB. This is the first time an incident like this takes place involving a property rented through this platform in the country.

Carla’s body was found partially buried last Monday, in the same property where she was staying for only one night, the body had wounds inflicted with a bladed weapon on arms and neck and a blow to the head likely caused with a blunt force weapon.

The suspect of the murder is a Nicaraguan man that was working as a security guard for the lodging facility.