LOS ANGELES -- 'Hotel Hell,' where dozens of youths were found living in filth this week, is just one of a hundred rundown structures giving squalid shelter to homeless teenagers in Hollywood, a counselor said Thursday.
Occupants of the once fashionable Garden Court Hotel -- whose former residents included several silent film stars and producers like Mack Sennett and Louie B. Mayer -- said the building has been a haven for runaways and deserted youths since it was vacated a couple of years ago.
'Estimates are that a thousand people arrive on the streets of Hollywood each month without a place to say,' said Lois Lee, director of Children of the Night, a non-profit organization founded to aid child and teenage prostitutes.
'They get word on the streets about places they can stay, and that's what attracts them to this area. From the kids we deal with, we've identified 25 of these buildings and there's probably about 100 of them.'
Among them are a mansion once owned by screen idol Errol Flynn at the foot of the Hollywood Hills. Another was reported to be an apartment, which lists singer Rod Stewart as one of its owners, that was partially destroyed by fire this summer.
Attention focused on the abject conditions at 'Hotel Hell' after TV crews accompanied Children of the Night counselors to the filth-ridden, four-story labyrinth on Hollywood Boulevard Wednesday afternoon.
Dozens of residents -- some as young as 12 -- told of being raped, drugged terrorized and forced into prostitution by pimps. About 50 youths were staying in the garbage-strewn structure, using drugs, setting fires and existing without food supplies or running water.
'Hotel Hell' got its name 'because it's so dark, there's a bunch of holes you fall into and people are setting fire all the time,' a teenager called Potatohead explained.
Miss Lee's group relocated 27 of the youths, including three pregnant teenagers, at church missions and similar facilities. But she conceded Thursday that most will be back on streets, living in similar conditions, within days.
A dozen youths who remained Thursday at 'Hotel Hell' -- some said they had lived there off-and-on for as long as three years -- said they were not aware of illicit sexual activity in the building.
'That's not the problem,' said an 18-year-old called Motorhead. 'What we have coming in and out of this place is people without places to stay.'
A 19-year-old woman, who said her name was Trouble, said she had been homeless for six years.
'My mom threw me out of the house when I was 13,' she said, 'So I hitchhiked to California from Tennessee where I've been living like this ever since.
'Most of these kids have similar stories. We're not doing this for kicks, we just don't have any place to stay.'
Miss Lee, who began her program in 1979 while studying at UCLA, said most of the youths roaming the streets of Hollywood had problems at home.
'A lot of them are incest victims, many of them come to us with physical scars, the result of beatings they've experienced over a period of time,' she said.
'Many are forced into prostitution by pimps. Others -- both boys and girls -- turn to lightweight prostitution for survival.'
Police insisted the old hotel is no more notorious than scores of other boarded-up structures around the once-glamorous Hollywood area.
'From time-to-time we chase people out,' said Lt. Roger Combs, 'but they always come back because they've got no place to go.'
Ileana Welch, coordinator of the city Cultural Heritage Board, said the building is owned by C.D. Investment Co., whose efforts to demolish it have been contested in the courts by preservation groups.
The building, just one block from the famed Chinese Theater, has been declared an historical-cultural monument for both its elaborate architecture and its former stature as a home for entertainment celebrities.
