KC hotel employee charged with attempted rape after allegedly copying woman’s room key
An employee at a downtown Kansas City hotel is charged with attempted rape after a guest told police the man broke into her room and sexually assaulted her.
Fletcher Clardy III, 30, of Kansas City, Kansas, has been charged with first-degree attempted rape. He has since been fired from the Hotel Phillips at 106 W. 12th St., where he worked at the time of the allegations.
Police responded early in the morning on Dec. 17 to the hotel where a guest told them she had been sexually assaulted by the man working at the front desk, according to charging documents.
The Star does not typically name victims of sexual assault.
The woman told police that she flew into Kansas City for a business trip the day prior with two co-workers and her boss. They watched the Chiefs game that night in the hotel restaurant and bar, then headed up to their rooms, court records show. The victim packed for her early flight the next morning, then went back downstairs at 11:45 p.m. to have a few drinks at the hotel bar.
Clardy was at the bar serving the woman and other hotel guests at the time, according to the criminal complaint.
Between 2 and 2:30 a.m. on Dec. 17, the victim retired to her hotel room for the night, court records show. She told police she locked the door before heading to bed.
The woman woke up between 4 and 4:30 a.m. to Clardy pulling off her pajamas as he exposed his penis to her, according to the criminal complaint.
“Get the fuck off of me! Who the hell are you? Get away from me! Get the hell out of here!” she told police she screamed at the suspect.
Her attacker responded, “Sorry, I thought you wanted it,” she told police, adding that she recognized his voice as the man at the bar and front desk.
She told police she believed her attacker to be Clardy and positively identified him in a photo array from police.
The woman’s boss, who was also staying at the hotel, told police that he woke up to a phone call at about 4:30 a.m.
The woman was on the other end of the phone, crying. Her boss went to her room where he found her “distraught, in tears, and a mess,” according to the complaint.
She told him that she woke up to a man sexually assaulting her, court records show. She said she yelled at him to get off of her, and then he left the room.
When police arrived, the hotel’s general manager and chief engineer gave police records of the hotel keys created that night and their usage, as well as surveillance footage from the hotel. Police found that a duplicate key was made for the victim’s hotel room at about 4:10 a.m., while the woman was in her hotel room. Video shows Clardy made the key.
Surveillance video shows Clardy getting into the elevator a few moments later, according to the complaint. The key records show that he then used the duplicate key he made to open the woman’s hotel room door.
Clardy was fired from the hotel on Dec. 30 and taken into police custody on Dec. 31, court records show.
A defense attorney for Clardy was not listed in court records.
His initial appearance is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Monday at the Jackson County Courthouse. His bond is set at $150,000 cash.
This story was originally published January 5, 2022 at 11:08 AM.
