In the last week, residents of the western United States have been overwhelmed by a piece of news.
Lake Mead, located on the border between Nedahua and Arizona, is the largest reservoir in the United States and has provided domestic water and electricity to more than 40 million people in seven southwestern states and parts of Mexico since its completion in 1936.
Due to persistent drought and climate change, lake mead has dropped by 52 meters since 1983, leaving only 30% of the water reserve. Experts say it is the worst drought in 800 years.
Last August, the federal government first declared Lake Mead water short, and even issued a summer water restriction order.
However, before people could adjust to the sudden water supply disruption, something even more terribly arose:
As the water surface drops, the lake slowly fades, and human remains begin to appear in the lake, and a police spokesman said more bodies will be found in the future.
On May 1, Shawna and her husband went paddling on Lake Mead, and when the boat docked on shore, they heard a scream from a girl not far away.
Shauna rushed forward with her husband to check it out, only to see the girl pointing to the tin bucket on the ground, so frightened that she could not speak.
Nearly half of this tin bucket was buried in sediment, and it could be seen that it had sunk to the bottom of the lake for a long time, and it had only recently been exposed to the water, and from the appearance, it had long been eroded by the lake.
Peeking inside through the rusty notch, Shauna's husband found a skeleton, its entire body curled up in a tin bucket, shirt and belt still glued to the bone.
In a hurry, several people quickly called the National Park Service where Lake Mead is located, which confirmed that it was indeed a human bone.
During the press conference, local police revealed some brief information.
Extrapolating from the clothes and shoes the victim was wearing when he was found, the person was murdered in the mid-1970s or early 1980s, killed by a bullet, then stuffed into an iron barrel and finally thrown into Lake Mead.
For decades, the iron barrel has been tens of meters underwater, and as the drought intensifies, the water level moves down before it gradually emerges.
Police added that the true identity of the deceased could take years to determine, as there was no so-called DNA database in the 1980s and the victim's identity could only be determined by interviewing a large number of missing family members.
Police declined to disclose more information about the age and gender of the deceased, but before the press conference, investigators told reporters:
"I believe many people have guessed that there will be more corpses in this lake."
Hearing these words, the residents around Lake Mead realized that the water they had drunk for so many years had soaked countless corpses.
"In other words, people in several states are drinking water soaked in decomposing corpses."
"Hmmm... This water is quite 'human'."
"I'm going to throw up!" They've been drinking... Isn't it, drinking water soaked in dead people now?! Who knows what else to drink? ”
"So... I've been drinking water soaking corpses since I was born?? ”
"People drink the water there all the time. Water soaked in corpses. Wait, there aren't corpses in all the water, right? Have I ever drunk such water? ”
However, before it was too late to respond, the police's words had already been confirmed.
A few days ago, while walking by the lake, a pair of sisters found the remains of the second group of human beings, which, unlike the first, had no cover-up such as an iron barrel and was found deeply trapped in the mud and sand.
At first, the two witnesses only thought it was the bones of a bighorn sheep, but it wasn't until they saw the skeleton and teeth that they realized it was human remains.
Because there were no more clues, the police had to fence the perimeter of the scene and wait for more information to be excavated.
Although the official did not say too much, many netizens have discussed rumors about Lake Mead in the comments: it is only a 30-minute drive from the gangster-lined casino Las Vegas, which is known as one of the most ideal places to dump the body of a murder.
"The desert around Las Vegas must have buried a lot of people."
"You can see more bodies at lower water levels, as is the case with Lake Mead."
"When I used to live in Las Vegas, I used to take my dog to the desert north of the city to play, and one day a ranger drove to me and asked me if I was okay?
I also wanted to take a walk and do something, only to be told that an unnamed corpse could be found here every few weeks. ”
Some netizens have already guessed the "real culprit behind the scenes".
"With the climate dry, the crimes of the mafia when they ruled Las Vegas are finally about to be exposed."
"Surprised? A lake next to Las Vegas, the base camp of gangsters, someone must have been thrown in to feed the fish. ”
"The bet is related to the mafia."
There are also other netizens who feel that the comment area is overreacting.
"Don't you know that since the end of 1950, gangsters have been throwing bodies into the lake?" A lot of people around me don't even go swimming here, is it necessary to be so shocked? ”
"Surprised? It's just that a well-known secret has been made public. ”
"As drinking water, it will definitely be filtered and purified, right?" Don't fish in the water also and pee? ”
As netizens analyzed, these human remains are most likely the work of the mafia at that time.
In the late 1940s and 1980s, Las Vegas casinos were run by mafia, and in order not to let the feuds between gangs affect the casino business, Lake Mead became their tacit criminal dumping ground.
Former police officer David Colmer said that during his tenure, he received countless cases of disappearances of "no one alive, no body in sight":
A man was accused of killing his mother and brother in 1987, but the body has been missing; a hotel employee disappeared inexplicably in 1992; a father from Utah disappeared in the 80s...
Former Las Vegas mayor Oscar Goodman also admitted in an interview that "this is indeed a good place to dump corpses."
He added that in the past, when he was a lawyer, clients were often interested in the "climate issues" in the newspaper, saying that it was better to keep the lake in place, otherwise who knew what would be found in the lake.
Like the sins buried deep in Lake Mead, the former mayor has witnessed the development and legends of the city of Las Vegas.
"When I was mayor, whenever I went to a place where buildings were being built, I was unconsciously nervous, afraid that any piece of rubble would dig out my former client."
In addition, the "iron barrel throwing corpse" is also a recognized aftercare method of local gangs, the most famous case is the death of the well-known gang leader "Handsome Johnny" Roselli.
The rossel-controlled gang controlled nearly Hollywood and the Las Vegas Strip, and rumors were that he had been involved in the Kennedy assassination and planned the assassination of former Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
In 1976, a fisherman found an iron barrel in the sea near Miami containing a decomposing corpse, none other than Rosselli, who had been missing for 10 days.
But the most mentioned by netizens in the comments section is whether the police will find Jimmy Hoffa in the lake.
"Will Jimmy Horfa be inside?"
"Are you finally going to find Jimmy Hoffa!!??"
Jimmy Hoffa was a well-known figure in the United States in the 1960s, he was the president of the International Truckers Union, the leader of the largest union at the time, and Jimmy was even able to fight with the Kennedy family at his peak.
Jimmy Hoffa, played by Al Pacino in the film The Irishman
At that time, rail transportation in the United States was not developed, and a country's logistics relied on trucks, so truck unions had a fair say in both politics and society.
As the president of the union, Jimmy is in charge of the $8 billion truck driver pension.
At that time, the gangs also had cooperative relations with the unions, and some dirty jobs entangled with the government would ask the gangsters to come forward, and the gangsters would get votes from the unions to expand their influence in the political arena.
The casino city of Las Vegas was founded by gangsters with the financial support of the union.
Gradually, black-and-white Jimmy naturally became a thorn in the side of many people.
In 1975, Jimmy Hoffa suddenly and mysteriously disappeared, and the whereabouts of this legend became one of the most talked about.
Now, Jimmy Hoffa's case has been moved to the front of the stage again with Lake Mead, adding another legend to the "Las Vegas Past".
In April, the highest water level in Lake Mead was exposed to the air, and the local water authority had begun fetching water in the deep water area.
I believe that in the near future, countless evils at the bottom of the lake will surface, but at that time, will the residents still have water to drink?