LINCOLN COUNTY, Mo. — Lincoln County Prosecuting Attorney Mike Wood wants the murder trial of Pamela Hupp to be moved again.
Hupp was charged with first-degree murder in July 2021 for allegedly stabbing Betsy Faria to death in 2011. Last year, Wood and defense attorneys agreed to move the case to Greene County, which is about 200 miles southwest of Lincoln County. But on Friday, his office announced it would be refiling murder charges to try to find another location closer to Lincoln County.
Editor's Note: The above video is from Nov. 2022.
In a statement, Wood said he still wanted to find somewhere outside of Lincoln County to hold the trial but said Greene was too far.
"As my office has continued its in-depth planning to conduct what we estimate will be a month-long trial, it is more and more apparent that the physical distance between the scene of the crimes and Greene County will cause cumbersome and inefficient delivery of justice," he said in the statement.
Greene County is about a 4-hour drive from Lincoln County.
Faria's husband, Russ Faria, was convicted of his wife’s murder in November 2013 and sentenced to life in prison. But defense attorney Joel Schwartz fought the conviction and filed a successful appeal for a new trial. The conviction was overturned in the re-trial, and Russ was freed after spending three years in prison.
In July 2021, Wood charged Hupp with Betsy Faria’s murder, accusing her of framing Russ Faria for the crime.
Charging documents state the day of her death, Betsy Faria had chemotherapy treatment. She was at her mother’s house playing board games with friends when Hupp showed up and insisted on driving Betsy home, court records recount.
Prosecutors said Hupp waited until her friend was weak and lethargic from a chemotherapy treatment before she began stabbing her repeatedly as she lay on a couch under a blanket. Then, she dipped the victim's socks in her own blood and spread it around the house to make it look like her husband killed her in a domestic assault, according to court documents charging Hupp with the 2011 murder.
In announcing the murder charge, the prosecutor announced he would investigate whether there was any prosecutorial misconduct on the part of his predecessor, Leah Chaney, or the police who investigated the original case.
In an exclusive interview with 5 On Your Side, Chaney maintained her conduct during the prosecution of Russ Faria was “above board” and denied any wrongdoing. She said she never considered Hupp as a suspect because she didn't believe Hupp was physically capable of inflicting the level of stab wounds Betsy Faria suffered. She said she won a conviction against Russ Faria because the evidence police gave her all pointed to him.
Hupp is already serving a life sentence for the murder of Louis Gumpenberger in 2016. She entered an Alford plea in the case three years later.
Hupp shot and killed Gumpenberger during a staged home invasion and attempted robbery inside her O'Fallon, Missouri, home, claiming she was acting in self-defense. Prosecutors called it a desperate attempt to try and take attention away from her involvement in Faria's case.
In the summer of 2019, following Hupp's Alford plea, Wood announced he would be reopening the Faria investigation. The Major Case Squad of Greater St. Louis was part of the review.
Wood has said he will seek the death penalty in the case of Betsy Faria's murder.