Intruders Scale Bend Hotel ‘Like Spider-Man’

A California couple staying on the fourth floor of The Oxford Hotel in downtown Bend had a rude and unusual awakening early Saturday — a man entering their room by the balcony?s sliding glass door, police said. He was one of two Bend men who had climbed the hotel “like Spider-Man” to get there, then climbed back down and ran, but were later arrested, a sergeant said.

Bend police responded around 2:30 a.m. to the ?luxury boutique? hotel at 10 NW Minnesota Ave after the guests, Robert and Michelle Seiwert of Auburn, Calif., called the concierge to report the surprising visitor to their room, said Sgt. Ron Taylor.

The couple told the concierge they had been awakened by a man later identified as Peter Michael Landman, 26, who came in through the unlocked balcony door and was now walking around their room.

Robert Seiwert said he yelled at Landman, who then left the same way he came in, Taylor said.

Landman and Benjamin Ryan Shirley, 31, who also had been on the balcony, then scaled down the side of the hotel and ran away, the sergeant said.

“Well, they just scaled up the side of the building like Spider-Man,” Taylor told NewsChannel 21. “That is as good of an analogy as I could come up with.”

The sergeant said he’s pretty sure the pair “got onto a few balconies and finally found one with an open door.”

“I don’t think they were intending on committing any violent crimes — just intoxicated and seeing what they could actually do and get away with,” he added.

A Bend police sergeant spotted Shirley running south in Tin Pan Alley, from Minnesota Avenue, Taylor said. He chased Shirley to the Chase Bank on Franklin Avenue, where he was found hiding near a Dumpster and taken into custody without incident.

An investigation revealed Landman was the second suspect in the case, Taylor said. He had taken a bottle of wine from the couple?s room, but left it on the balcony before climbing down the side of the hotel, the officer said.

Landman was contacted by phone and turned himself in to officers still in the area.

Landman was booked into the Deschutes County Jail on first-degree burglary and criminal trespass charges, with bail set at $22,500. Shirley was charged with criminal trespass and held on $2,500 bail.