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Pamela Hupp, Who's Serving A Life Sentence For Murder, Pleads Not Guilty In Brutal Slaying Of Close Friend Betsy Faria
Pamela Hupp has been charged with first-degree murder and armed criminal action in the 2011 slaying of Elizabeth “Betsy” Faria.
Pamela Hupp, the eastern Missouri woman who is currently serving a life sentence for the 2016 murder of a man with mental disabilities, pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to the stabbing death of her friend a decade ago.
Pamela Hupp, 60, has been charged with first-degree murder and armed criminal action in the 2011 slaying of Elizabeth “Betsy” Faria. She is accused by Lincoln County prosecutors of stabbing Faria to death then staging the scene to make it appear that Faria's husband had brutally killed her.
Faria had been found knifed to death on Dec. 27, 2011 with 55 stab wounds. Her husband, Russell Faria, was convicted in 2013 for her killing, but the conviction was overturned in 2015 and he was acquitted at re-trial. Prosecutors said that detectives rushed the investigation and concealed evidence that pointed to Hupp as the killer. The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department reached a $2 million settlement with Russell Faria in 2020 for the wrongful conviction.
Hupp is accused of killing Faria four days after persuading her to switch a $150,000 life insurance policy to make her the benefactor. She declined to respond to reporters’ questions as she was led out of the courthouse, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Hupp was sentenced to life in prison without parole in August for the 2016 killing of Louis Gumpenberger, a man with mental disabilities from a prior accident, who she fatally shot in an attempt to frame him as a hitman to allegedly cover up the murder of Faria. Prosecutors said that Hupp lured Gumpenberger to her home, claiming she was a producer for NBC’s “Dateline” and was in need of help reenacting a 911 call.
She then shot him and told emergency dispatchers he'd been an intruder, prosecutors said.
She was announced in October 2019 as a suspect in that killing.
Prosecuting Attorney Mike Wood said he will seek the death penalty if Hupp is convicted of first-degree murder in Faria's death.
