Getting away with murder: Nebraska cold cases
See unsolved or suspected cold case homicides that have occurred in Nebraska. The purpose is to raise awareness in hopes that someone may have information regarding any of the cases and will provide that information to law enforcement.
You can submit a tip about any cold case homicide by contacting the Nebraska Information Analysis Center via the Missing Persons Hotline at 877-441-5678 or by email at NEfusioncenter@nebraska.gov.
Patricia Webb
A new employee of the Adult Book and Cinema Store disappeared overnight April 18, 1974, along with 51 bondage-themed adult magazines, a calculator and $30. A cord leading to an extension from a pay phone had been cut and the shop door left unlocked.
Two and a half days later, a man went to feed cattle on a vacant farm he owned east of Hallam and found her bullet-riddled body.
Patricia Carol Webb was nude under the hay, except for a quilted jacket, one of 143 extra-large jackets distributed by a feed mill and given to customers or sold to employees. Webb, 24, had a piece of tape over her mouth.
Thirty-eight years later, her death remains one of Lincoln’s greatest murder mysteries.
“This case has been investigated, reinvestigated, reinvestigated. A lot of effort put into it,†said Lincoln Police Sgt. Larry Barksdale, who was tasked with the investigation since the early 1990s. Barksdale retired in 2012, but the case remains open.
Together, Lincoln police, the Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office, Nebraska State Patrol and FBI logged nearly 15,000 man hours during the first year alone. They even consulted clairvoyants.
Tina McMenamin
Tina McMenamin, an 18-year-old UNL freshman, was stabbed and sexually assaulted in her apartment on July 25, 1995.Â
Gregory Gabel, a mentally ill Lincoln man, was arrested in the homicide and has always been the prime suspect, an investigator said, even after pivotal DNA evidence failed to link him to the crime scene. Gabel has a computerlike memory for numbers and facts and a history of following women at businesses and public events, retired investigator Rich Doetker said in 2005.
McMenamin was killed in the minutes before she was due at work at Godfather's Pizza at 5:30 p.m. that night in 1995. Roommate Sarah Bognich found her friend in a pool of blood that night.Â
"The apartment was ransacked. I walked past the bedroom a couple of times before noticing her on the floor. My life changed after that. I tried to go back (to college), and I couldn't ever finish."
A single hair clutched in McMenamin's hand led police to Gabel. It matched his DNA, a one-in-1,049 chance. Circumstantial evidence also linked Gabel to the apartment building. And a man matching Gabel's description was seen fleeing the crime scene, Amberwood Apartments, 4600 Briarpark Drive.
That night, Gabel was a block away at a Sonic Drive-In. He was there every Tuesday night, cleaning up in exchange for food. And Gabel had earlier convictions for third-degree sexual assault and public indecency. Police arrested him a year after the crime.
But two years later, when a different DNA test proved the hair was not Gabel's, he was released. That hair, however, didn't necessarily belong to the killer, Doetker said. The investigator also has suspicions about the validity of the second DNA test, conducted in a Pennsylvania lab.
"There were questions that came up: Was it the right hair? The same hair?" he said.
Murder charges were dropped against Gabel with the hope that additional evidence would be found to re-arrest him, Doetker said. If the case went to trial and Gabel was found innocent, Doetker added, he could not be retried if new evidence came to light.
Mary Hepburn-O'Shea, who has worked in the mental health field in Lincoln for decades and has known Gabel for many of those years, said in 2005 that the man lost two years in jail for something he didn't do.
Hepburn-O'Shea runs downtown O.U.R. Homes, the city's largest provider for developmentally disabled people that also houses people with mental illnesses. Gabel lives and works there. "He's a weird kid," she said. "He's not ever a violent kid."
Then-Assistant Police Chief Jim Peschong, speaking in 2005, added that you can't try a case on personal beliefs and supposition. Peschong said he personally believes there is a suspect in the crime, but he declined naming anyone.Â
Ali Saleh Al-Saidi
A 30-year-old Iraqi refugee with a new bride and a new home was slain in 2001 in the city where he came to begin a new life. Ali Saleh Al-Saidi's body was found in June 2001 in Salt Creek, east of the North 70th Street bridge near the Abbott Sports Complex. Then-Police Chief Tom Casady said Al-Saidi suffered "significant traumatic injuries."
Friends and family members said that Al-Saidi moved to Lincoln from Dallas a few months earlier. He had lived five years in Texas and was in a Saudi Arabian refugee camp before his arrival in the United States.
Casady called Al-Saidi a "Gulf War era" refugee and said he had recently married an 18-year-old Lincoln resident and fellow Iraqi exile.
Al-Saidi wed Azher Alghazawi on June 16. She spoke about the husband and friend she lost. "He's a good man," she said. "I love him very much." A welder by trade, Al-Saidi also loved to fix cars. He enjoyed making people laugh with funny faces.
Azher said her husband left their South 18th Street apartment to find an apartment key around 10:45 p.m. the day before his body was found. It was the last time she saw him alive. Just hours earlier, said Saleh Al-Daraji, a longtime friend of Al-Saidi's, he had helped Al-Saidi move some belongings from his old D Street apartment.
Authorities did not know whether the slaying took place near Salt Creek or whether the body was moved. Police found Al-Saidi's 1991 Chevrolet Caprice parked beside a curb at the corner of 21st and Dudley streets, then-Capt. Allen Soukup said.
In September 2001, a Lincoln couple who had been earlier interviewed by police about the slaying were arrested while trying to flee the country, authorities said.
Rabeha Kadhim Zaher Al-Atbi and her husband, Asaad Al-Asady, tried to board a flight to Syria from O'Hare International Airport, Lincoln Police Investigator Kathy Phillips said. "I'm not going to label them suspects," Lincoln Police Capt. Gary Engel said.Â
According to the affidavit signed by Phillips seeking the arrest of Al-Atbi as an accessory to a felony, she lied to police during a July 5 interview about Al-Saidi's whereabouts on the night of his slaying and about having had an affair with him. She later admitted to police she had had an affair with Al-Saidi, according to the affidavit.
The arrest affidavit goes on to describe how interviews with Iraqis in Lincoln have led police to believe Al-Saidi's death was a "crime of honor" and that Al-Saidi was killed for having brought shame or dishonor to his or another Iraqi family.
Gina Bos
Gina Bos disappeared near Duggan's Pub in downtown Lincoln on Oct. 17, 2000, at the end of open mic night. She put her guitar in her trunk and then vanished.
The cold case is classified as a missing persons case, although it’s highly unlikely Bos, 40 when she disappeared, is alive. Koziol declined to detail the leads the department has chased, citing the open investigation.
Bos was a middle child in a large, close-knit family; she was waiting for a Habitat for Humanity house and had begun a new job when she vanished.
Bos’ sister, Jannel Rap, became the family’s spokeswoman early in the search. She started the Squeaky Wheel Tour, traveling the country performing and bringing attention to Gina and others who are missing in the cities she visited. She also started 411 GINA, a website with a hotline for tips about her sister’s whereabouts.
Said Koziol: “Someone knows what happened to her. Hopefully one day they will finally find it in their soul to come forward.â€
Ann Marie Kelley
Law enforcement hoped someone would remember seeing the dated minivan Ann Marie Kelley was driving when she disappeared. Neither has ever been found. Â
Carl Bittner
K.K. Kody
Christi Nichols
Donald Bennett
Ernestine Ruschy
Eugene McGuire
Jay Durnil
Mary Heese
Gregory Moore
Irvin Settje
Jason Remsen
Jason Vesper
Brian Walker
Arthur Morley
Jay Blockson
Jeanne Kassebaum
William, Bernice and Barbara Peak
Jeffrey Snoddy
Joy Blanchard
Demetrius Simpson
Julie Derrick
Leah Rowlands
Letha Harley
Mary Cabral
Mary Cronin
Merlin Mosel
Mitchell Simon
Patrick Vostades
Rebecca Williams
Richard Chadek
Richard Lessley
Robert Beaudoin
Robert Heelan
Rudolfo Flores
Russell McKnight
Sandy Green
Sarah Neal
Tyrone Banister
Waddell Robinson
Charles Hanks
Constance Baasch, 68, of rural Grand Island, died on Feb. 28 from injuries suffered in October.
A Hall County judge set bond at $5 million for Logan Hunts Horse, who is accused of killing Todd Scherer at Fonner Park in Grand Island.
Bart Beutler is facing seven felony charges, including first-degree murder, which carries the possibility of life in prison.
Four women are suing The Lund Company for negligence, alleging that the company allowed a now-convicted sexual predator to continue working as a maintenance technician despite multiple complaints.Â
The City of Omaha will appeal the jury verdict and other orders in a lawsuit that resulted in a police captain being awarded nearly $1 million for claims of retaliation.
Natividad Zuniga and Graciano Nava Zuniga were among four passengers in the car.Â
A 76-year-old Omaha man died Saturday night after being struck by a car near 32nd and L Streets.
An 81-year-old man has died following a two-vehicle crash last week in Columbus, Nebraska.Â
A Lincoln woman entered a guilty plea Monday in Cass County District Court to a charge of motor vehicle homicide in connection with a crash that killed a Greenwood woman.
A person incarcerated at the Omaha Correctional Center died Tuesday at an Omaha hospital, according to the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services.
A pedestrian died after being struck by a vehicle southwest of Waterloo early Friday morning.
Armon Rejai, who is charged with first-degree murder, told police he opened his front door and shot, fearing for his safety.
An 18-year-old Lincoln man who arrived at the hospital late Friday with gunshot wounds died, according to the Lincoln Police Department.
Experts believe the skeletal remains found two weeks ago in rural Douglas County are those of an adult man. Â
Brandon Dolezal, 25, will serve 20 to 28 years in prison on charges of child enticement and possession of child pornography.
Kevin Wengler was reported by the Predator Poachers, a group that monitors the internet in hopes of catching child predators.
An Omaha woman was arrested Saturday night on suspicion of second-degree murder in connection with a fatal shooting last year in the Florence neighborhood.Â
Police have identified the man killed early Sunday when a car collided with a house in North Omaha.
A 35-year-old inmate at the Community Corrections Center-Omaha died on Wednesday, according to the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services.Â
Brice Gravert was driving a pickup that crashed in the area of U.S. 30 between 20th Road and 21st Road.
A 24-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the death of a Kearney man whose body was found near Cunningham Lake in March.Â
A Howard County man is facing four felony charges for allegedly driving drunk and causing a car crash that left one man dead and three people seriously injured.Â
The former police chief of Oakland, Nebraska, will be sentenced in July after pleading guilty Friday in federal court to misdemeanor misappropriation of public funds.Â
Three of the four people arrested in connection with Omaha's first and only homicide of 2023 appeared in court on Tuesday.Â
A former high school and junior high teacher at a northeast Nebraska school will stand trial for allegedly having sex with a 17-year-old male student.
Investigators are working to determine the cause of death and identity of the deceased, police said.
Sarpy County Judge Tricia Freeman ruled that the evidence presented by Ryan Larsen's mother was insufficient to prove the death of the La Vista boy who disappeared in 2021.
A Washington man facing two felony counts of motor vehicle homicide in connection with a deadly crash in Furnas County last week appeared in court for the first time Monday.
A Douglas County judge last week found a former security guard at Omaha North High School not guilty of two counts of first-degree sexual assault of a child.Â
A 37-year-old Kimball man was sentenced to 30 to 40 years in prison Tuesday after being found guilty of manslaughter in the shooting death of his wife.
An Omaha woman's death is being investigated after she allegedly jumped from a ninth-floor apartment of an Omaha Housing Authority building.Â
Three teenage boys from Blair have been charged as adults in connection with an alleged sexual assault that was later distributed on video.Â
Authorities are seeking information on the whereabouts of Nebraska City woman who has been missing since the first of the month.
Funds are being raised to help with funeral expenses for a 34-year-old man being hailed as a hero for protecting his sister from a gunman in Blair on Friday.Â
A search of newspaper articles in an online database of newspapers across the state and the county doesn’t turn up much about Kerry Girard, a Scottsbluff woman missing since 1997.
Mercedes American Horse was found safe Wednesday afternoon — nine days after she disappeared, the York Police Department said in a social media post.
Logan Hunts Horse has been set for trial in September for the first-degree murder of Todd Scherer.
At a preliminary hearing Monday, an Omaha Police detective testified to new details in the March death of 68-year-old Gary Lew. Four people, including Lew's daughter, are facing charges in the matter.
A Cass County District Court judge on Monday ordered a 19-year-old man charged with first-degree murder to undergo a mental examination to determine if he was sane at the time of the slaying.Â
An Omaha man accused of leaving the scene of a crash that killed his wife was ordered to be held on $10 million bail during his initial court appearance Wednesday.Â
An Omaha man is facing one count of manslaughter for his alleged involvement in the beating death of Carlos Salguero-Canar.
An Omaha woman accused of arranging for a man to be beaten to death earlier this month had her bail set at $10 million during her first court appearance Thursday.Â
Joshua Sund, 42, was sentenced to 400 months — just over 33 years — in federal prison after pleading guilty to producing pornography involving a prepubescent minor.
A Ponca man on Monday pleaded no contest to sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl.
A former Tekamah police officer has been charged with two felonies in connection with his activities during a police standoff in Lyons on Feb. 25.
A 56-year-old man died on Friday while undergoing treatment at the Reception and Treatment Center in Lincoln.
A 47-year-old Denton man was sentenced for federal charges related to the distribution and possession of a multitude of drugs.
Avery Rhodes, 36, of Omaha, was ordered held on $250,000 bail during a court hearing. He must pay 10% of the amount, $25,000, to be released from the Sarpy jail.Â
A teenager was killed in a one-vehicle crash near Springfield early Monday.
A homeless man told Omaha police that he was beaten and robbed last week while attempting to share a large sum of money he found in a downtown alley.Â
New details came to light at a hearing Wednesday in a gruesome double murder last year that left law enforcement scouring Lincoln's landfill for remains of one of the victims.Â
Prosecutors are adding a murder charge against a 24-year-old Bellevue resident who has been held since April in connection with the death of Kearney man whose body was found near Cunningham Lake.
The death of an elderly woman found in a home just north of Fort Calhoun early Monday is under investigation.Â
A 28-year-old man from Mexico was arrested after the Nebraska State Patrol said he was transporting 133 pounds of marijuana through the state.
A 30-year-old man is in custody in Texas awaiting extradition to Nebraska on charges of killing a woman in her home outside Fort Calhoun.
A Beatrice man was sentenced to up to 18 years in prison this week after being convicted of possessing child pornography.
A Norfolk man has been arrested in connection with two burglary incidents, one of which also involved arson.Â
The 16-year-old boy shot and killed early Sunday morning was a junior at Burke High School, according to a statement from the school district.Â
Multiple Omaha police officers fired at a man suspected of pulling a gun on someone Tuesday night, injuring him.Â
Two people, including a 17-year-old girl, have been arrested and charged with robbery in connection with a series of three assaults and robberies that took place on Monday, police said.Â
An Omaha man pleaded guilty Friday to possessing child pornography whilst on federal probation and, as part of a plea agreement, is expected to be sentenced to the mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison.Â
Two 16-year-old boys were arrested and 22 firearms were recovered from a stolen vehicle after a reported burglary at the EZ Money Pawn Shop in south Omaha early Friday morning, police said. Â
An Omaha man was arrested Friday on suspicion of felony child abuse and possession of child pornography, and police believe there may be more victims due to his involvement in the community.
An Omaha man arrested in connection with the slaying of his brother last week at their home near Fontenelle Park is being held on $500,000 bail.
Twenty-four-year-old Ja'Sean Coleman of Omaha died early Monday at an Omaha hospital following a shooting in the Old Market neighborhood.
David Phillips shot a Michigan man on March 1, 2023, during a verbal altercation at a tower work site about 2 miles north of Hartington.
Kyiaz Ulanov, 29, of Lynwood, Washington, pleaded no contest to two motor vehicle homicide charges for a crash last year that took two lives and critically injured three others.