Cold Cases in Sioux City, Iowa
The cases are listed in chronological order beginning with the oldest. Click on links for additional information and/or feature stories.
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Homicide: Eight-year-old Jimmy Bremmers disappeared on August 31, 1954, after visiting friends on the block where he lived on Sioux City's west side. His body was found by county workers almost one month later on Sept. 29. Ernest Triplett – an itinerant music salesman for Flood Music in Sioux City – was arrested, charged and convicted in Jimmy's death, but the conviction was overturned in 1972. |
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Homicide: Donna Sue Davis, 22 months old, was abducted from her crib in her Sioux City, Iowa, home the evening of July 10, 1955. Her battered body was found the following day at the edge of a South Sioux City, Nebraska, cornfield. |
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Homicide On Friday night, February 13, Catherine Decora attended a party at the home of 63-year-old Kenneth Taylor in Sioux City. She left and then returned to his home after someone beat her severely in the alley outside his home. She died at a hospital early the following morning. |
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Triple Homicide:
At 11:22 a.m., the bodies of three persons were found brutally murdered in a rented two-story home. The mother of victim Ernest Isom discovered the bodies. Freta (Bostic) Isom – pregnant at the time – was found on the dining room floor, wearing only a housecoat, shot once through the back. Ernest Isom – shot five times in the head and body – lay naked on a mattress on the living room floor. Jesse Hanni was found fully clothed, wearing a winter jacket, shot once through the back and once behind the left ear in execution style. |
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Missing Person: On Feb. 16, 1983, the Sioux City Police Department received a report of a missing person – 58-year-old Maurice Kneifl – by Kneifl's girlfriend, Joyce Fish, and her daughter Lori. Maurice was reportedly last seen on Feb. 14, 1983, driving his 1981 dark brown Fleetwood Cadillac, bearing Iowa license plate HIZ379. He had left Joyce's residence around 9:30 p.m. Kneifl owned and operated Fethke Cleaners located at 1209 W. 26th Street. An exhaustive search has turned up no leads as to his whereabouts. |
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Homicide: On Oct. 1, 1983, 18-year-old McCauley was reported missing by her mother. She was reported last seen alive on Tuesday, Sept. 27, 1983, at approximately 2:15 a.m. in the area of W. 7th & Omaha in Sioux City. At approximately 8:15 a.m. on Oct. 6, 1983, her partially decomposed body was located in a wooded area in the vicinity of 33rd & Pavonia Street by a local resident walking his dog. The victim had died from a shotgun wound to the face. |
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Missing Person: At approx. 5:50 a.m., South Sioux City Police located a 1984 Chevy Cavalier – registered to Zellmer – parked on the south end of the Veterans Memorial Bridge. Sioux City Police were called to check Zellmer's residence at 1003 Pierce Street, Apt. B-3, and found it empty with nothing unusual within the apartment. Family members reported he had suffered from depression for years. A search of the Missouri River proved unsuccessful. |
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Unidentified White Male: At approx. 9:42 a.m., Sioux City Police responded to a report of a man down under a bridge near Marx Trucking. Marx employees had observed smoke and a noxious odor coming from the area the day before. Investigators located the body of man -- believed to be between 40-50 years of age -- burned beyond recognition, with a gas can located between the victim's legs. A nationwide search has not determined the man's identity. |
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Homicide: Just after climbing into the back passenger seat of friend's vehicle after a party, Kevin Clark was shot at approximately 5:19 a.m. on Dec. 8, 1991, by a black male subject who approached the 1981 Chevy Citation with 9 millimeter rifle, shouted an obscenity and then began firing into the vehicle. Clark – who had in his possession a 38 Titan Special revolver – returned the gunfire, but was struck three times in the torso. |
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Homicide: Betty Swetnam was found dead at the bottom of her basement steps on January 1, 1994. The 73-year-old grandmother had been stabbed multiple times. |
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Missing Person: On October 9, 1996, Marie Harker contacted the Sioux City Police Department to report her adult son, Kenneth Harker, as missing. According to Marie, Kenneth suffered from a head injury he'd received several years earlier that had left him disabled. Four days earlier on October 5, Harker's 1977 white Chevy Suburban, while parked on a gravel road, had been tagged by the Plymouth County Sheriff's Office as an abandoned vehicle. |
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Homicide: At approx. 2:00 a.m., David Redowl and his 24-year-old sister, Sonja, had a physical altercation in the back yard of their mother's residence on West 3rd St., which both Redowl and his sister listed as their home. Sioux Police were contacted about 2:07 a.m, and found Redowl with a stab wound to the chest. |
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Homicide: Wilbur Brown was found lying on the ground between a curb and the sidewalk at 603 West 5th St. in Sioux City, Iowa, about 5:30 a.m. on Sept. 14, 1997. An autopsy revealed he'd been beaten about the head and body and died as a result of those injuries. |
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Homicide: Patricia Jauron's body was discovered by her husband Gene at their former home across the road from where they'd just moved after she left to show someone a waterbed and didn't return home. Patricia had been stabbed multiple times with such force the blade broke off in her chest. |
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Missing Person: Greg Stover 44 YOA DOB: 7/20/54 White male Missing since 3/8/99 |
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Missing Person: Adrian Reuwsaat was reported missing to the Sioux City Police Department in Sioux City on November 3, 2002. |
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Missing Person: Helen Kelly of Sioux City, Iowa, was reported missing by her husband on May 18, 2005. Kelly left behind her purse and had not mentioned plans to travel anywhere. She has never been heard from again. Her gold 2000 Honda Accord with Iowa license plates numbered 953EDK also remains missing. |
Anyone with information on any of the above Sioux City cases should
contact Sioux City Police at 712-279-6390.
Page last updated July 3, 2010
