Body found in barrel in Lake Mead identified as Arkansas man after DNA testing, Las Vegas authorities say

By Chris Boyette, CNN

A body found in a barrel in Lake Mead in 2022 has been identified as an Arkansas man after DNA testing, authorities revealed Thursday in a case that sparked a frenzy of questions and speculation decades after his death.

Edward Lelburian Jackson, believed to be in his 50s, was likely fatally shot sometime in the early 1980s, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Homicide Lt. Robert Price said.

The update Thursday sheds more light on the mystery four years after the barrel was discovered in the Nevada reservoir’s receding waters.

A visitor to the nation’s largest man-made reservoir discovered the body in May 2022, finding it in a metal barrel so corroded that she could see the decomposed remains of a man sealed inside, authorities had said.

The 2022 discovery was one of several oddities found around the lake that year as the reservoir – affected by drought and water overuse – plunged to then-record-low levels, revealing objects that had long been underwater. The body in the barrel was the first of four sets of human remains found there in 2022 – and until now was the only one that had yet to be identified.

The bones in the barrel found in May 2022 still wore battered light blue jeans with a Vidal Sasson-style design on the pocket, a 2X-sized striped short-sleeved button-down shirt, size 11 Velcro sneakers and a silver Timex watch, authorities had said.

Detectives estimated at the time that the man was killed sometime in the mid-1970s to early ’80s based on the clothing and footwear, Las Vegas police said in 2022.

When the body and barrel were discarded, it was likely done in a location that back then was hundreds of yards offshore, when Lake Mead was more full, Las Vegas police Lt. Ray Spencer said in 2022.

“If you were to go back 40 years ago, where the victim was found was probably about half a mile to a mile offshore,” Spencer said then.

“That area is now considered the shoreline” because Lake Mead shrank, he said.

The body’s discovery kicked off a flurry of public speculation about Las Vegas’ historic mob ties, though investigators repeatedly dismissed the theories, saying there was no solid evidence to support the claims.

Investigators were able to use DNA analysis and investigative work to identify three of the other sets of remains found at the lake in 2022, but the identity of the body in the barrel had been more difficult.

A body discovered soaking in water after decades makes genetic genealogy difficult, and at the time the victim is believed to have died, DNA of the victim would not have been on file because it was not widely collected then.

“The person (who disposed of the body) took a lot of steps to make sure that the victim had not been recovered,” Spencer told CNN in 2022.

Lake Mead was 1,225 feet above sea level at its height in 1983. But in May 2022 the lake’s water level was around 1,054 feet.

Though Lake Mead rose some in 2023, it is now lower – at 1,037 feet – than it was in May 2022.

Lake Mead was formed in the mid-1930s when the Hoover Dam was constructed on the Colorado River, and supplies water to millions of people, including in Arizona, Nevada, California and Mexico.

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CNN’s Elizabeth Wolfe and Laura Paddison contributed to this report.