LAS VEGAS (AP) – A New Hampshire man jumped to his death at Hoover Dam early Tuesday, hours after calling police to say he had killed his girlfriend at their Las Vegas Strip hotel room, authorities said.

Police received a 911 call about 12:15 a.m. in which a male caller told police they could find a woman’s body in a room at the Treasure Island hotel-casino, police Capt. Tom Lozich said. The man matter-of-factly provided the woman’s Social Security number and her drivers’ license information, Lozich said.

Inside the room, hotel security officials discovered the body of a woman who appeared to have been beaten and strangled, Lozich said.

The Clark County Coroner’s Office identified the dead woman as Rebecca Roux, 27, of Sanford, Maine, and said she was beaten to death.

A short time after the 911 call, Hoover Dam police noticed a man sitting outside his car atop the dam wall, said Colleen Dwyer, spokeswoman for the Bureau of Reclamation, the federal agency that oversees the dam about 30 miles east of Las Vegas.

The man told officers he had killed his girlfriend in Las Vegas, Dwyer said.

Hoover Dam was shut down about 1:30 a.m., and Las Vegas police were called in to negotiate with the man, Dwyer said.

Lozich said officers at one point unsuccessfully tried to use a Taser gun to subdue the man, who had briefly come down from the wall. The man returned to the ledge and about 4 a.m. jumped some 700 feet to his death.

Las Vegas police said the Mohave County Coroner’s Office in Kingman, Ariz., identified the man as Lawrence Joyce.

Police said they believe Joyce and Roux were romantically involved, but not married. Lozich said the two had been staying at the hotel for a couple of days.

Hoover Dam reopened about 6:30 a.m. to traffic crossing the Nevada-Arizona border along U.S. 93, the main route between Phoenix and Las Vegas.

There have been about 30 suicides at the dam since it was completed in 1935.



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