Having worked in hotels for 15+ years this story does not ring true to me at all.
While it is possible for a crafty thief to get into a hotel room, it is usually very difficult. The most popular method is to enter the room when the housekeeper is cleaning it. However nowadays most housekeepers know that they will lose their job if they allow this to happen. The housekeepers usually will ask the guest to exit the room while they finish cleaning and then firmly close the door behind them so that it must be entered with a key. The next most popular method is to claim that you were accidentally locked out of your room at the front desk and have no ID, etc. as you had just gone to get some ice (visit a friend, look out the window). Again, Front Desk Clerks know they will lose their job for allowing someone in a room they are not supposed to be in. They will ask questions of the person claiming to be from the room that can be answered by looking in the computer, such as home address, date they checked in, etc. etc. and then send a Security Officer to the room with the guest to obtain ID after entering.
As for opening a safe...there are safety procedures in place in all hotels. A safe, by definition, means that money or valuables is involved. There is no way a hotel employee is going to just open up someones safe for them. ID would need to be presented, Security would be involved not just Engineering, and possibly a formed signed by the guest.
I cannot under any circumstances, imagine a breakdown in security procedures like what is described in this story. And if by some wild means this did happen, then I would not think the hotels $500 liability would be in effect as they were the ones that opened the safe. Which would again point to the reasons why a hotel would spend a lot of time and effort ensuring this did not happen.
The only way I could see this happening was if it was an employee of the hotel that had access to the safe opening device. And they would have had to know about the room having a larger than normal amount of cash on hand, which seems unlikely for someone in the Engineering Department as they have little guest contact except in situations like this. I have said this before, but after 15 years of working in hotels I have NEVER had a staff person be proven to have stolen from a guest. They are often accused, but after investigation it is always someone else that stole the money or valuables.
There are so many ways to determine what happened anyways. The electronic key doors store the information about what key "hit" them to open the door and when. They would be able to read the door, find out what key opened it at the time the theft occurred and then go back and determine if it was the guests key or an employee key. And if it was an employee key, then what employee. They would be able to look at security cameras in elevators and other key areas to determine who was near the room at that time. And there is most likely some sort of procedure for "signing out" the key cutting device or safe opener from Engineering by the Engineers, as most hotels do not want this type of thing floating about in a hotel willy-nilly. Sometimes this device is even kept in the Security Department instead so that there is an even bigger checks and balances for it.
Just a little "inside" information.
Jennifer
Why would the family be broke if they had $10k in travelers checks stolen? I would think they could be replaced in fairly short order. After all... isn't that why people carry travelers checks??? 
... all disney did in return was give us park admission, hotel rooms, meals, drinks and a bunch of t-shirts /toys 
