CHARLOTTE, N.C.-- A man is dead after a night with friends turned tragic at an uptown Charlotte hotel.
Friends tell NewsChannel 36, 27-year-old John Billingsley was staying at the Omni hotel and hanging out with friends when just before sunrise they decided to make a toast from the roof of the hotel.
All they had to do first was find the right door to get access, the friends say.
Instead of finding stairs their search led them to the door for an air shaft and that's how Billingsley fell.
He died at the scene.
Hotel security found him right around 5 a.m. Sunday. Now CMPD's homicide unit is investigating where he gained access to the air shaft.
"We have several areas where we believe he could have got in. But, at this point we're not really sure, one, where he got into the shaft, and once we determine that, we'll be able to determine how far he fell," says Sgt. Nick Pellicone with CMPD.
Police have not confirmed how Billingsley entered the air shaft, but friends tell NewsChannel 36 they were on the top floor.
The hotel isn't commenting.
Billingsley was visiting from Asheville where he was a news photographer for a TV station there.
