People USA — August 21, 2017

was a prominent witness—then acquitted of the

killing in a second trial in 2015. “The evidence

seems to indicate that she hatched a plot to find an

innocent victim and murder this innocent victim

in an apparent effort to frame someone else,” said

the prosecutor, Tim Lohmar, who plans to seek

the death penalty against Hupp when her case

goes to trial in April 2018.

The one common thread in all three deaths is

that Hupp was the last to see each victim alive—

and that she stood to benefit from their passing.

Though Betsy and Russell’s marriage had its “ups

and downs,” according to a lawsuit Russell filed

against Lincoln County Prosecutor Leah Askey

after his acquittal, the couple had taken a cruise

with friends a month before Betsy’s murder and

were “very happy.” Four days before her death,

Betsy had changed the beneficiary of her $150,000

life insurance policy to Hupp, whom she’d met

while both worked in an insurance office. Testi-

mony in a later civil case over the money revealed

Betsy had been weighing divorce, had received a

terminal cancer diagnosis and wanted someone

to make sure her two daughters from a prior

relationship received the death benefit. But the

daughters say they have yet to receive any cash

from Hupp. “[Hupp] was one of [Betsy’s] hun-

dreds of friends—definitely not her closest,” says

Swaney. “[Betsy] made a rash decision, and I think

she made a wrong decision.” In the investigation

into Betsy’s murder, says her daughter Mariah

Day, “[police] didn’t look at Pam Hupp at all.”

That changed after Russell Faria’s acquittal,

and police say Hupp killed Gumpenberger, who

sustained a disabling brain injury in a car crash in

2005, in a scheme to divert attention from herself

in the case. Authorities theorize that Hupp posed

as aDateline producer and randomly recruited

Gumpenberger with an offer of cash to help her

reenact a 911 call. She then took him to her home

and shot him while trying to make it appear

Gumpenberger was acting on Russell Faria’s be-

half to kidnap, rob and kill her. (A witness told po-

lice Hupp had unsuccessfully tried to hire her with

a similar story.) In Gumpenberger’s pocket police

found a handwritten note that included the name

“Faria” with instructions to kidnap Hupp, get

“Russ’s money” from her at her bank, then kill her

to collect $10,000. Police also say that a $100 bill

in Hupp’s bedroom was a sequential match to four

$100 bills in Gumpenberger’s pocket, “extremely

uncommon for two people who reportedly do not

know each other.”

Now as authorities reexamine the murder of

Betsy Faria—and also look again at the death

of Hupp’s mother—Betsy’s sister Julie Swaney

remains hopeful that justice will be done. “I hope

it gets sorted out,” says Swaney. “I have faith that

one day we will have all the answers.”•

3

MONEY TRAIL

Hupp appeared in

court in February

2016 after Betsy

Faria’s daughters

sued to reclaim

their mother’s

life insurance.

‘I DON’T FEEL

THERE WAS

JUSTICE.

THERE ARE

SO MANY

QUESTIONS’

—BETSY’S

DAUGHTER

MARIAH

86 August 21, 2017 PEOPLE

1

2

CLUES AND

QUESTIONS

1.Hupp’s mother

fell to her death from

this balcony in 2013 in what was

initially ruled an accident.

2.Russell Faria (with Betsy in

2009) was eventually acquitted

of his wife’s murder. His blood-

stained slippers were evidence at

his trial.3.Hupp (at her Aug. 23,

2016, arrest) later stabbed herself

in the neck and wrist with a pen

in a police station bathroom.