‘Heartbreaking’: Woman, child found dead in north Charlotte hotel, police say

Detectives with the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department said a woman and her child were found dead Friday afternoon at north Charlotte hotel.

Police have identified the victims as 36-year-old Shannon Solomon and a 1-year-old boy.

CMPD does not suspect criminal activity involved with the deaths at a hotel in the 5000 block of Equipment Drive, which is near West Sugar Creek Road and Interstate 85.

Officers were called to the hotel at around noon to assist MEDIC with a call for service.

Investigators said the two had likely been dead for weeks.

The hotel is the former HEAL Charlotte Transitional Housing Program.

Some of the families from that program are still there but is the hotel is now home to a program called Heal Empower Love Protect (HELP).

The housing director said they have a roll call every morning to ensure people are OK and keeping up with the program, which is how the bodies were found.

“One of the maintenance men came in and said, ‘Meka, there’s a serious situation going on. We found somebody dead,’” said Cemeka Mitchem, the housing director for HELP. “And I said, ‘Excuse me?’ It’s very, very heartbreaking.”

Mitchem said the woman who died was part of the former HEAL Charlotte program so she was not part of the daily checks. But HELP did check on the room to see what was going on.

She said some of the residents smelled something in recent weeks but there was a roof leak, so they thought it was water damage.

Mitchem also said that neighbors next to that room heard the baby crying several weeks ago.

Police have not said how the woman died.

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