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It's a situation that no one should ever face - being stranded in a city far from home with no family or support system to turn to. This nightmare became a reality for three children from Texas after their mother was brutally murdered in a Las Vegas hotel room.

On May 28, 2023, around 1:30 p.m., the Las Vegas Police Department received a call about a suicidal man and was dispatched to the MGM Grand Hotel at 3700 South Las Vegas Blvd. Officers found a man with self-inflicted injuries and an unresponsive woman lying nude inside a hotel room. The man was identified as 42-year-old Fernando Gomez.

When asked what had happened, Gomez told the police he had grabbed a piece of glass from a smashed bottle on the floor and pushed it into her neck, then strangled her to death. Gomez took the same glass and cut his arms and neck before passing out. When he woke up, he showered and attempted to clean up the crime scene before calling his brother to inform him of what had happened. According to the report, Gomez had planned to jump off the building, but his brother convinced him to call the police.

The woman was Nydia Lopez Garcia, a 37-year-old single mother from Mesquite, Texas, who had traveled to Las Vegas with her three children on vacation. On Saturday, May 27, she spent the day with her kids sightseeing. That evening she dropped the children off and put them to bed in their hotel room. The following day she did not arrive at their room.

On Monday, May 29, the Clark County coroner's office called Nydia's family to inform them of her passing. The next day an article from News8Now Las Vegas was released. Gomez claimed that he and Nydia had been married before separating in 2022 and that her murder was part of a suicide pact they had made. His statements and the evidence shared with Nydia's family by investigators are conflicting. They believe he is trying to humiliate her memory further and attempt to set up his defense. There is currently an open investigation with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

Friends and family members remember Nydia as a loving, caring mother who always prioritized her children and would never leave them behind. She had suffered abuse from Gomez for 14 years, and his assertion that they were married is untrue. A few months before her death, Gomez had tracked her car and shown up to a date she was on and tried to fight the man she was with. Nydia's family believes that from the moment she left him in 2022, he planned on killing her. Nydia fought with all she had to escape from him and return to her children.

Nydia's family is primarily focused on the kids. They are currently stuck in Las Vegas indefinitely. A judge in Nevada has granted emergency custody to Nydia's sister. Still, she said she is not allowed to leave Clark County until the jurisdiction of her niece and nephew's case has been turned over to Texas. Having to pay for the stay in Las Vegas, legal fees, and the cost of shipping Nydia home, in addition to her funeral, has put a huge financial strain on the family. Any help to their GoFundMe, resources, or advice would be appreciated.

Nydia's murder is a stark reminder of the devastating impact that domestic violence can have on families and the urgent need for greater awareness and resources to support victims and prevent these senseless tragedies from occurring. It's a reminder that we must do better for our communities and children so they never face the horror of being stranded without support in the aftermath of domestic violence.

The National Domestic Violence Hotline is available at 1-800-799-7233, and other resources are available at thehotline.org.

Nydia Lopez-Garcia

TEXAS TRUE CRIME BLOG

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Nydia Lopez-Garcia

Carla Walker

TEXAS TRUE CRIME BLOG

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