When the Mafia in Las Vegas wanted to dispose of a murdered body, then the deep waters of Lake Mead were the ideal spot - with the body often stuffed into a steel drum.
Known as a "Chicago overcoat", that and a pair of "concrete shoes" were enough to guarantee the corpse would never see light again.
Or so the Mafia thought.
However now, in an unexpected result of global warming, Lake Mead is starting to reveal its chilling secrets, The Mirror reports.
The surface of the lake, located along the borders of Nevada and Arizona, is now 52 metres lower than it was in the 20th century, revealing at least one victim of a Mafia murder.
Las Vegas police were called on May 1 after leisure boaters spotted the remains of a man in a rusted barrel near the lake’s Hemenway Harbour.
The victim’s gunshot wound and “Chicago overcoat” barrel container indicate a Mob whack.
Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Homicide Lieutenant Ray Spencer said the type of trainers on the body dated the killing to the late 1970s or early 80s.
He added: “The water level has dropped so much over the last 30 to 40 years that, where the person was located, if a person were to drop the barrel in the water and it sinks, you are never going to find it unless the water level drops.
"The barrel did not move. It was not like the barrel washed up.”
Lake Mead, and the building of the Hoover Dam which formed it, became synonymous with the disposal of bodies in Las Vegas from the 1930s onwards.
Las Vegas history professor Michael Green, 57, thinks the body is by no means the last that will emerge.
He told the Mirror: “With water levels declining, it’s very possible we’re going to have some very interesting things surface.
“I wouldn’t wager on them finding missing Mob king Bugsy Siegel, but I believe there are going to be a few more bodies nature may reveal.”
Geoff Schumacher of The Mob Museum, believes there are three possible identities for the body.
They include William Crespo, who turned state’s evidence after being arrested for smuggling cocaine.
Another is George “Jay” Vandermark, a gambling machine cheater trusted by the Mob to oversee its slot machine operation at the Stardust casino in Las Vegas.
He double-crossed them, signing his own death warrant.
But Mr Schumacher says the leading candidate is Johnny Pappas.
The Chicago native was a veteran Las Vegas casino host who vanished on August 18, 1976.
Pappas left home to meet two men who said they were interested in buying his boat on Lake Mead.
His wife, Cheryl, told police her husband went to Jo-Jo’s restaurant on Las Vegas Boulevard to negotiate the deal. He never came home.
Mr Schumacher, one of the world’s leading experts on the Mob, said after researching the question: “Jay Vandermark, not necessarily likely, although he was the first guy anybody thought of because it was the most high-profile disappearance.
“There was court testimony in 2007 in Chicago by a hitman who became a government witness.
"He testified Vandermark was killed in Phoenix and buried in the desert, so I tend to believe that guy.
“Crespo was really more of a drug dealer.
"He had ties to the Mob, and he was gonna be testifying against some.
"He was providing information about the Mob, which made him a target.”
But he added: “Johnny Pappas is more likely to be the victim.
“They could have used Pappas’s own boat to dump him into the lake.”
Prof Green, of the University of Nevada, whose father dealt blackjack at casinos, agrees.
He said: “It’s very hard to identify victims of the Mobs.
“Dental records are often used, but sometimes the bodies are so badly beaten, it’s hard to do that.
“My theory would not have initially been Mob because they did not want to associate Las Vegas with their dirty work.
"If you are going to dispose of someone like famous mobster Bugsy Siegel you do it in Southern California.
“If it’s [Union boss Jimmy] Hoffa, it’s in Detroit.”
But he said the .22 calibre bullet thought to have been used, and the barrel, made him “more willing to believe it was the Mob”.
He added: “Others were killed and left in a barrel. Maybe it was the method of choice.
"Based on the arguments being made about Johnny Pappas by people I think highly of, I could see it.”
Mr Schumacher also has a theory on a possible killer: hitman Tony Spilotro, fictionalised as Nicky Santoro in the 1995 mob movie Casino, played by Joe Pesci.
“Tony Spilotro was the enforcer for the Chicago mob in Las Vegas,” Mr Schumacher said.
“If you talk to law enforcement people during the time he was in Vegas, he was involved in a lot of violence.
He was accused of being involved in more than 20 murders.
“Although he may not have pulled the trigger, he’d have known about it if the Chicago mob called the hit.”
Spilotro’s weapon of choice was known to be a .22 calibre pistol.
The lake has recently yielded another body, though it is not so certain it is a homicide victim.
Paddleboarding on May 14, Lindsey Melvin at first thought she had spotted a sheep’s jawbone. Then she realised the teeth had silver fillings.
Lindsey, 30, said: “I was like, ‘Whoa, this is human,’ and freaked out.”
The Clark County coroner has yet to determine whether the death was suspicious.
With 70% of the lake’s water gone, there are ecological consequences as well.
Largemouth bass, channel catfish, sunfish and rainbow trout are all threatened.
The wider ecosystem involving bighorn sheep, mule deer, coyotes and bobcats is affected too.
But Troy Davis, 58, who has fished in Lake Mead since he was a boy, has more practical concerns.
He told the Mirror: “The waters here are only going one way, and that is down. The fish I used to catch are slowly becoming less and less.
“The way this is going, I may catch a body soon. I’m going to need a stronger rod if that happens.”
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