Salem woman falls down trash chute, breaks leg trying to retrieve keys

A Salem woman trying to recover her friend’s keys fell three stories down a trash chute and broke her leg when she landed in a trash compactor that turned on.

Loring Towers resident Nelia Linatopi was offered $20 to help a friend whose keys were stuck to a garbage bag and accidentally went down the chute with trash, WCVB reported.

Linatopi’s first strategy was for someone to hold her feet while she entered the chute head-first, WHDH reported. After that method failed to recover the keys, Linatopi had a friend tie a sheet to her, and she was lowered into the chute.

When the sheet tore, she fell from the second floor and landed in the basement in a trash compactor, which turned on and broke her leg, WHDH added.Linatopi was screaming in pain when police arrived on the scene.

“The person who lost the key could have just asked the office for a new key,” Jesesnia Morales, a resident of Loring Towers, told WCVB. “They make keys here.”

Linatopi was moved to Massachusetts General Hospital, where she was expected to recover, according to WCVB. Police were investigating the incident.