The 1967 killing of Gloria Faye Slump remains one of southwest Iowa’s haunting unsolved murder cases. Gloria, a 24-year-old secretary at an Omaha investment brokerage firm, was found dead beneath the Pony Creek trestle near Council Bluffs on March 6, 1967. Railroad employees discovered her frozen body after noticing a trail of blood leading from a nearby county road to the isolated area where she had been dragged. Authorities later determined she had been dead for several days.
According to Pottawattamie County Medical Examiner Dr. A. L. Sciortino, Gloria had suffered a brutal attack. She had been beaten and stabbed 14 times in the throat with what investigators believed may have been a dull knife or a tool similar to a beer can opener. Officials said there were no signs of sexual assault. The case shocked both Iowa and Nebraska communities because friends and coworkers described Gloria as deeply religious, kind, and well-liked.
Investigators learned Gloria had recently told her parents she had met a “nice guy” and planned to bring him home for a weekend visit, but she never arrived. Attention quickly turned to 24-year-old Jerry E. Neve of Omaha, who had reportedly been seen with Gloria before her disappearance. An abandoned vehicle belonging to Neve was discovered near the crime scene a day before Gloria’s body was found.
Neve was questioned by authorities and voluntarily submitted to a polygraph examination administered by the Iowa Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Reports indicated the test showed deception when he was asked about Gloria and whether he had knowledge of her death. Despite growing suspicion, he was released. Just days later, on March 11, 1967, Neve died by suicide from a shotgun wound in the backyard of an Omaha home. His stepfather later claimed Neve denied killing Gloria and said he became overwhelmed by the investigation and circumstances surrounding the case.
Evidence continued to surface after Neve’s death. FBI testing reportedly matched cloth fibers found in Neve’s vehicle to Gloria’s clothing. Months later, Omaha police recovered Gloria’s missing coat from a hotel room previously connected to both Neve and another man, Herschell L. Gitchell, who at the time was facing burglary charges. Despite the discoveries, no one was ever formally charged in Gloria Slump’s murder.
Gloria Faye Slump was born April 7, 1942, in Red Oak, Iowa, to Kathleen Ione Williams and Carroll Riggs Slump. She attended Grace Bible Institute in Omaha and was remembered by family and friends for her strong Christian faith. Following her death, investigators found a handwritten message inside a Bible in her apartment that read: “I am a stranger here. Heaven is my home. Danger and sorrow stand around me on every hand. Heaven is my fatherland. Heaven is my Home.”
Funeral services for Gloria were held March 10, 1967, at Mission Covenant Church, and she was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Red Oak, Iowa. Nearly six decades later, her death remains an unsolved mystery that continues to be remembered in Iowa true crime history.
Information for this article was based on reporting and research by Nancy Bowers for Iowa Unsolved Murders: Historic Cases.
Gloria Faye Slump
