A Florida man was taken into custody after police say he turned a bizarre hotel encounter into a violent assault that left a woman injured.
According to Local 10 News, the Aventura Police Department identified the suspect as 28-year-old Elmoncy Sercle. Investigators say the Florida man first connected with the victim through Seeking.com and continued the conversation on WhatsApp. The two eventually agreed to meet on August 29 at the Serena Hotel in Aventura.
According to the arrest report, the woman, who asked not to be identified, entered Sercle’s hotel room and found the door already open. Once inside, she told police he asked to smell her feet and offered to buy her worn sneakers. She explained that she was a foot model and quoted her usual rate of $1,000. At the time, she was wearing sandals and told him her sneakers were in her car.
Detectives said the meeting took a strange turn when the Florida man ran out of the room as she stepped into the bathroom. Believing he had taken something, the woman chased him into the hotel’s parking garage. There, she saw him in a red Mercedes SUV.
Police said Sercle first drove past her before making a three-point turn and striking her with the vehicle. The woman sustained bruises and abrasions across her chest, arms, and back, requiring immediate treatment.
“He did a three-point turn and actually hit me with a car. Ran me over,” she said in a separate interview with Local 10 News. “By the grace of God, I’m still standing today.”
The victim called the experience not only terrifying but also deeply unusual. “I’ve met a lot of people who have foot fetishes, obviously, and nobody has ever done anything to this caliber,” she said.
The Florida man fled the scene but returned days later to book another room at the same hotel. Staff alerted authorities, who arrested him on Thursday, August 29, on a charge of aggravated battery. Detectives also linked him to other incidents with a similar pattern.