Unsolved Mysteries Episode “Death in a Vegas Motel”: What Happened to Buffalo Jim Barrier and Who Killed Him?

Unsolved Mysteries has just released the second part of season 3, with 3 more episodes that talk about murders, disappearances and a paranormal incident. The first of these 3 new chapters is called Death in a Vegas Motel and explores the case of a man who was found dead in his room, in a motel in “Sin City”, which led the authorities to try to define if was it a suicide or was it a murder (something similar to what happened with the Tiffany Valiante case, which was also explored in this season).

The cases of Unsolved Mysteries are not closed, so the series is limited to presenting the facts, presenting clues and inviting the public to participate, thinking that, perhaps, there is someone among the viewers who may know something more about it. The case of Buffalo Jim Barrier is the same and it is not even known if someone killed him, or if he decided to end his own life.

Unsolved Mysteries: Who Killed Buffalo Jim Barrier?

In the previous chapter, the series presented the case of David Carter and the main suspect who is missing, but what happens when the victim is also a suspect? Jim was a professional wrestler and promoter (reported to have worked with the likes of Hulk Hogan, Muhammad Ali and Dwayne Johnson) who later started his auto shop and dealership where he sold all manner of cars to his Las Vegas customers, and his life ended on April 6, 2008. That day, the cleaning staff found him naked, with white powder on his face and dead in the bed of the motel where he was staying, and the authorities, after performing an autopsy, The cause of death was determined to be accidental suicide.

Jim had told his family that he was meeting a friend the night before and security cameras show that he arrived at the motel around 8 pm, after which his family could no longer contact him. No signs of a crime were found in the room, but the family was convinced that something had happened to Jim there and they revealed that he had a problem with the owner of a local club, so they thought that a man named Rick Rizzolo, who also had mob connections, may have murdered Jim to end his problems with him.

In addition, the family said that someone had threatened to kill Jim, and it was found that he had been with a woman named Lisa a few hours before his death. The authorities questioned Lisa and she originally said that she did not know Jim, but later she confessed that they had been together on one occasion she even said that she was in the room with him and that when she left he was still alive, but later He changed his story again and assured that he left it there when he began to have convulsions after having used cocaine (the white powder that was found was not analyzed, but it is assumed to be cocaine).

Due to a lack of evidence, the police were unable to determine if Lisa had done anything to Jim, but the family believed that she may have been working for Rick Rizzolo and that she was the one who killed Jim on his orders, as a form of revenge due to Jim having testified against him in court and, as his Landlord, not allowing him to expand his nightclub. To this day, no one can say for sure what happened that night at the motel.