In a Missouri correctional facility, Pamela Hupp is serving a life sentence for the murder of a disabled man named Louis Gumpenberger. Last year, she was charged with another brutal killing—her friend Elizabeth “Betsy” Faria, for which Hupp is currently awaiting trial.
The story of Pam Hupp and the crimes in which she’s entangled have captivated true crime buffs for years, first as episodes of NBC’s Dateline in 2014 (among their most successful ever, next to their coverage of OJ Simpson and the murder of JonBenet Ramsey) and then as a hit podcast which debuted in 2019.
Now, Renée Zellweger takes on the role of Hupp in the scripted drama series The Thing About Pam. Here’s what we know about the real Pam Hupp.
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The death of Betsy Faria
Russ Faria spent every Tuesday with friends for game night. But on Tuesday, December 27, 2011, upon returning to his home in Troy, Missouri, Faria made a grisly discovery. His wife, Betsy, was dead. She had been stabbed more than 50 times and the knife still protruded from her neck.
Calling 911, Russ told the dispatchers that his wife may have killed herself. She had been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer earlier that year and had a history of threatening suicide. But investigators didn’t buy his story. Betsy’s death was far too brutal, and Russ was going in and out of hysteria during the 911 call, which led investigators to believe "his demeanor was staged."
The following morning, Russ was arrested and charged with Betsy’s murder. At trial, Russ was represented by attorney Joel Schwartz, who told the jury that his client had four solid alibis, offering proof of Russ’s whereabouts with cellphone data that showed he was more than 20 miles from the crime scene around the time of the murder had occurred.
How Pam fits in
According to court documents obtained by Dateline in July last year, the last person to see Betsy alive was her friend Pam. Pam had tracked Betsy’s movements on Tuesday, December 27, 2011, and offered her a ride home when she knew Betsy would be exhausted from a chemotherapy session.
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During Russ’s trial in 2013, Pam was a key witness against Russ. She claimed Russ was an aggressive drinker who verbally abused Betsy. Despite convincing evidence of his innocence—four alibis, the cellphone data, and a lack of blood on his clothes— the prosecutor accused the alibi witnesses of plotting “the ultimate role play,” per a FOX 2 local news report. The jury convicted Russ of murder, but that verdict was overturned and a new trial was ordered.
In Russ's retrial two years later, Pam was asked why she became the sole beneficiary of Betsy’s $150,000 life insurance policy. She tried to explain that $100,000 would be set up in a trust for Betsy’s daughters. The other $50,000? “My other girlfriend died of breast cancer in August,” Pam said at the trial, according to St. Louis magazine, “and she has a 12-year-old daughter that I’m trying to help.” As it turns out, the daughter’s friend never received any help.
Russ spent three years in prison before he was acquitted in the 2015 retrial. He later brought a civil suit against three police offers alleging they had "fabricated evidence" and "failed to investigate the other obvious suspect,” and was awarded $2 million in compensation in an out-of-court settlement, People reported.
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Louis Gumpenberger is fatally shot
In August 2016, Pam fatally shot Louis Gumpenberger, a 33-year-old with mental and physical disabilities. According to People, police said they found a note in Gumpenberger's pockets with instructions to kidnap Hupp and get "Russ's money." Pam told authorities that he had held her by knifepoint, demanding she drive them both to the bank, and that she had killed him in self-defense.
Prosecutors argued he had been slain to distract investigators from re-examining Betsy’s murder. In a meta true crime twist, Pam had allegedly lured him into her home by posing as a Dateline producer needing help with a story. According to the Associated Press, prosecutors alleged that Pam had attempted to deceive others with the same lie.
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Facing an almost certain conviction for murder in 2019, Pam entered an Alford plea, in which she acknowledged that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict her of murder, but in which she did not admit her guilt.
She was sentenced to life without parole, and the murder of Gumpenberger prompted prosecutors to reopen the Faria investigation. Pam was charged with the first-degree murder of Betsy Faria, to which she pleaded not guilty in July 2021. In a press conference, Lincoln County Prosecutor Mike Wood said he would pursue the death penalty.
“I do not take lightly the decision to pursue the death penalty, but this case stands alone in its heinousness and depravity, such that it shocks the conscience,” he said.
Pam awaits trial in the Faria case but maintains her innocence with respect to both the Faria and Gumpenberger deaths.
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The mysterious death of Pam Hupp's mom
Pam’s mother passed away in mysterious circumstances in 2013. Shirley Neumann was 77 years old and living alone in a third-floor apartment of a senior community in Fenton, MO.
She suffered from dementia and arthritis, so it wasn't unusual for her to get "unsteady" on her feet sometimes.
But on October 31, 2013, a housekeeper found Shirley’s body underneath the balcony of her apartment. The railing above was broken. Per the coroner's report, Shirley died from blunt force trauma to the chest due to an “accidental” fall. What was unusual, however, was the discovery of Ambien in her system—eight times the usual dosage. Police believe Pam was the last person to see her mother alive.
Detectives deemed they had no reason to suspect foul play. Shirley’s son, Michael Neumann, initiated a lawsuit against the retirement home, alleging the balcony railing was defective and flimsy, but the suit was dropped.
After the shooting death of Gumpenberger, Shirley’s case was reexamined and her cause of death reclassified from “accidental” to "undetermined."
Suzanne McCune, an administrator with the St. Louis County Medical Examiner’s Office, told Dateline: "The amount of evidence available is no longer clear and compelling enough to indicate that it was an accident.”
There is no ongoing investigation regarding the circumstances of Shirley Neumann's death, and no charges have been filed against anyone in connection with that death.
The Thing About Pam airs Tuesdays on NBC, with new episodes available to stream each Wednesday on Peacock and Hulu.
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