New life for Linda Vista Community Hospital

Caretaker Jesus Mena, 73, stands near a Hollywood-style morgue used by film crews inside the former Linda Vista Community Hospital in Boyle Heights.  (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

Caretaker Jesus Mena, 73, makes his morning rounds to see if there have been any break-ins inside what was the Linda Vista Community Hospital in Boyle Heights.   (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

An original scale has been left on the fourth floor inside the former Linda Vista Community Hospital in Boyle Heights.   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

Maurice Ramirez of Amcal Multi-Housing Inc. looks over the electrical-switch room at what was Linda Vista Community Hospital. Amcal plans to convert the former hospital into housing.  (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

A film crew member is silhouetted against the exterior of the former Linda Vista Community Hospital in Boyle Heights. The site, which some say is haunted, is set to be converted into apartments for low-income seniors.   (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

A Halloween mask peeks out at visitors to Linda Vista Community Hospital. Television shows that follow ghost hunters also have filmed overnight at Linda Vista, and the makers of one, called “From Beyond,” said the hospital was “home to the team’s most haunting night ever.”   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

The original emergency room from the 1930s is still largely intact.   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

“People tell me it’s the most haunted place in L.A.,” says Maurice Ramirez of Amcal Mult-Housing, which is giiving linda Vista a $40-million makeover. He sits on a throne left by makers of the upcoming film “The Lords of Salem.”   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

Linda Vista caretaker Francis Kortekaas ackowledges a couple of incidents he can’t explain. In the dimly lighted underground level housing the operating rooms, Kortekaas once saw the water turn on when he approached a sink where doctors scrubbed before surgery.   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

Linda Vista is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Los Angeles historical monument.   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)

“It’s going to look like an upscale hotel,” Amcal’s Maurice Ramirez says of Linda Vista’s makeover. “People in the neighborhood will really see a transformation.”   (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)