Police can’t verify serial killer’s claim of Las Vegas slaying

Las Vegas homicide detectives are still trying to verify serial murderer Samuel Little’s assertion that he killed a 40-year-old woman in the city in the early 1990s.

“We have not found any cases matching the description given,” Metropolitan Police Department homicide Lt. Ray Spencer told the Review-Journal on Thursday.

Metro detectives began looking for the matching case just over a month ago, when the FBI announced that 78-year-old Little, who is in custody in a Texas prison, confessed to 90 homicides in states from California to Florida between 1970 and 2005.

The possible Las Vegas victim has been described by the FBI only as a “black female, age 40, killed in 1993.”

It is not clear whether Metro’s homicide unit was still actively investigating Little’s claim or if homicide detectives believe it was a false confession. Spencer did not further elaborate Thursday.

In a statement in November, FBI crime analysts characterized Little as “among the most prolific serial killers in U.S. history.”

As of Nov. 29, the FBI said it had confirmed 36 killings. A Las Vegas FBI spokeswoman was unable to provide an updated total Thursday because of the partial shutdown of the federal government.

The FBI has said it is working with the U.S. Department of Justice, the Texas Rangers and dozens of state and local agencies to corroborate all 90 of Little’s confessions, which he offered while trying to obtain a prison transfer earlier this year. Convicted in 2014 of three counts of murder, Little is serving three consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.

He was linked to three unsolved homicides between 1987 and 1989 after the Los Angeles Police Department detectives obtained his DNA sample while he was in custody on an unrelated narcotics charge, according to the FBI. In all three cases, the FBI has said, the women were beaten and strangled before their bodies were dumped.

The FBI’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (ViCAP) has also conducted a full background check on Little, and what they found was an “alarming pattern” and links to many more killings, including a cold case homicide in Odessa, Texas, the FBI said.

Anyone who believes they may have information connected to Little is urged to call the ViCAP tip line at 800-634-4097 or at vicap@fbi.gov.

Contact Rio Lacanlale at rlacanlale@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0381. Follow @riolacanlale on Twitter.