Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast
Framed for His Wife's Murder: Russ Faria’s Shocking True Story
Mon, 03 Mar 2025
Russ Faria, Framed for Murdering His Wife, on Killer Pam Hupp: 'She Thought I Was an Easy Mark' Russ Faria knew he wasn't guilty of killing his wife, Betsy, but he also understood why police might suspect him.Book Link https://www.amazon.com/Bone-Deep-Untangling-Twisted-Tragic/dp/0806541970Need Prison Consulting? Book a Call With Dan Wise https://calendly.com/federalprisontime/matt-coxFollow me on all socials!Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/insidetruecrime/TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@mattcoxtruecrimeDo you want to be a guest? Fill out the form https://forms.gle/5H7FnhvMHKtUnq7k7Send me an email here: [email protected] you want a custom "con man" painting to shown up at your doorstep every month? Subscribe to my Patreon: https: //www.patreon.com/insidetruecrimeDo you want a custom painting done by me? Check out my Etsy Store: https://www.etsy.com/shop/coxpopartListen to my True Crime Podcasts anywhere: https://anchor.fm/mattcox Check out my true crime books! Shark in the Housing Pool: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0851KBYCFBent: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BV4GC7TMIt's Insanity: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08KFYXKK8Devil Exposed: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08TH1WT5GDevil Exposed (The Abridgment): https://www.amazon.com/dp/1070682438The Program: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0858W4G3KBailout: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/bailout-matthew-cox/1142275402Dude, Where's My Hand-Grenade?: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BXNFHBDF/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1678623676&sr=1-1Checkout my disturbingly twisted satiric novel!Stranger Danger: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BSWQP3WXIf you would like to support me directly, I accept donations here:Paypal: https://www.paypal.me/MattCox69Cashapp: $coxcon69
Chapter 1: What happened when Russ found his wife?
I walked in the door and was confronted with the scene that I don't recommend anybody ever see. I saw my wife brutally stabbed to death on the floor. Well, over 24 hours at that point, they asked me if I wanted to take a lie detector test. Well, having nothing to hide, I agreed to that.
In retrospect, and to anybody listening to this, I would recommend never, ever, ever in your life, if somebody asks you to take a lie detector test, to take one. To go out there and tell people that what happened to me. isn't the one-off thing. It happens to people all over our country all the time. So you're found guilty.
In my mind, I'm going to be here the rest of my life, so I might as well, you know, get used to it.
You know, when I was locked up in prison and I was writing guys' stories, you would hear one thing from the FBI or the investigators, and then I would order the Freedom of Information Act. And what I realized right away... is that one, you know, the left hand doesn't know what the right hand's doing.
And so I would get stuff, you'd have the Freedom of Information Act would give me documents that the FBI said didn't exist.
In my particular case, I had perfect storm of somebody trying to set me up. I had a bad prosecutor. I had a bad judge. I had a whole bunch of crooked cops. Does that happen all the time? No. Do people get wrongfully convicted all the time?
Yes. My whole thing is all of the things that happened afterward is just as bizarre. Like every single aspect of this story is just pure insanity. Hey, this is Matt Cox. I am here with Russ Faria, and he has a very interesting story. He has just an absolutely bizarre kind of murder mystery, just straight insanity, just based on what I've looked at. And
And, you know, I had never heard about this story and I've been looking into it. I mean, it's, it's, it's fascinating.
Uh, well, I was raised in a small suburb of St. Louis, Missouri, uh, called Florissant and grew up in a large Italian family there on my mother's side, uh, with frequent trips to Florida, uh, throughout my life, because it's where my father's side of the family is from. And, uh, just. basic middle class, uh, lifestyle growing up. And then, uh, we moved out to rural St.
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Chapter 2: What should you know about lie detector tests?
travel and go on cruises and so she planned a celebration cruise with a bunch of family in france for november of that year and i guess right around october of that year which was again 2011 she had a doctor's appointment and the doctor ended up calling us when we were out of town on a trip And saying that we need to go see the oncologist again. It didn't sound really good.
And when we got back, we saw the oncologist and found out that the breast cancer had returned. And this time it was in her liver and basically inoperable. He gave us a prognosis of about three to five years on the outside. You know, if everything went great. And that was another really big kick in the gut. And we had to deal with that. But Betsy kept a positive attitude.
She was always a positive person. And that said... She kept the plans for the cruise that she wanted. Because it was more... She decided to call it a celebration of life. And so we went on that cruise in November and... She got to swim with the dolphins, which was a lifelong dream of hers. You know, I do a lot of cool things that would be on most people's bucket list.
And we came back and had Thanksgiving prepared for Christmas and whatnot. And of course, kind of like, you know, you have somebody that, you know, isn't going to be around so much longer. You take a little bit more time with holidays, take a couple more pictures, you know, uh,
buy an extra gift or two you know because you know you're not going to have them that much longer and like we kind of did stuff like that and had christmas and we had to have i think three or four christmases with extended family and whatnot but uh we got those out of the way and betsy was actually staying at her mother's about a half an hour from where we lived because she had a
a chemo appointment. She stayed over there on the 26th of December. She had a chemo appointment on the 27th. I had to go home because obviously I had to work. The Christmas holiday was over and the 27th was my day to go back to work. So I worked all day and I had a prearranged, it was a Tuesday and I had a prearranged game night that I had with some friends of mine.
It was really only about five minutes from her mother's house. And I was going to pick her up on my way from that game night. That said, we communicated throughout the day, mostly by text, because by job I was on the phone all day long. It was really kind of hard to make a phone call, communicate that way.
And so there were a lot of texts back and forth between her and I. And at one point she decided or informed me that she wouldn't need a ride home, that her friend Pam was going to bring her home, which was really odd to me because Pam lived about 30 to 40 minutes from us. I was going to be five minutes away and be on my way home. And so I questioned it.
She said, no, yeah, she wants to give me a ride home. I says, okay, that's fine. Proceeded about by the rest of my day. Left home, and normally on that night, I would have dinner at my mom's, which was about five minutes from my friend's house, but I had errands to run, and I called my mom.
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Chapter 3: How did Russ end up in prison for a crime he didn't commit?
That's what you got to, you got to take. What's that? You went to like a maximum security prison. It's murder. So I'm assuming this is premeditated murder. Yeah.
I went into what they call level five camp, which is for everybody that's serving. That probably isn't going to get out. Yeah. In the foreseeable future. Wow. Joel went to work on my appeal at that time. Now, we had a local news team in St. Louis, a Fox affiliate, and a reporter by the name of Chris Hayes, who, if you look up the Fox 2 stuff, that is the most.
He was doing updates like every month when I was in jail and prison. Just keeping my story out there in the media, I think that really helped because it got a lot of attention that way. Another thing that happened was Dateline NBC was brought in, and I did interviews with both of those, with Chris Hayes and with Keith Morrison on Dateline from prison.
And those things were aired and I was starting to get support from people, not just across the state or across the country, but I was getting letters from people across the world supporting.
Uh, yeah, I, I did, I did a Dateline interview when I was in prison with Keith Morrison also, by the way. Okay. I had a vastly different experience with him because I was, because me being extremely guilty. I didn't get the same type of treatment you got. I can imagine. But yeah, so so that's great that they went in and I saw part of that part, the part that's on YouTube, part of that also.
And I saw some of the coverage. I never did see the movie. I didn't watch the movie. I did watch someone who critiqued the movie, who basically the critics they criticized as being like it was almost like a comedy. And this is a very serious, you know, it's serious, but it was almost, you know, comedic.
But like you said, in a very real way, with the exception of the murder, it was comedic how bad they bumbled the investigation and just really, I don't even know. Do you feel like the prosecutor thought she was doing the right thing?
I honestly don't. I think she thought that she was doing something to forward her career. She was very career minded. I don't think she was out for justice or anything. And then unfortunately, in our country, that happens more than what people realize. And there's a reason for that. There's a reason that shouldn't exist for that.
And one of the reasons why I do these interviews is to go out there and tell people that what happened to me isn't the one-off thing. It happens to people all over our country all of the time. And the reason for that is a little term that nobody should have ever heard ever is called prosecutorial immunity.
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Chapter 4: What role did Pam Hupp play in Betsy's murder?
Louis by the name of Steven Omer. And he's kind of got a reputation of being a straight arrow and a fair guy. And even a whistleblower among his peers, if he sees people doing things that are wrong. So that's the guy we wanted. We're like, oh, this, all we ever wanted was a fair trial. We knew if we got a fair trial, we would win. Right. So we agreed on Steven Omer and we had our
hearing in June of 2015 and it was decided at that time that I would get a new trial. And the only thing that was really concerning Leah Askey at the time, because this was part of what was in the appeal was that he wasn't making that decision based on the fact that she had fair with the detective. That's that was her main concern. Right. He didn't want that to come up.
He said, that has nothing to do with it. He says, that ain't going to come up in the case. He said, everything else here is very troubling. And this is why this guy is getting a new trial. Yeah. There's plenty to go around. And we're going to schedule it today. So they scheduled my trial for again in November. And then I had to go back to prison. And, uh,
So I wasn't real happy about that because now I knew I'd been locked up for about three and a half years. And I'm not some guy off the street that's never been to prison. Now I've been in prison. I'm now what we'd call a seasoned prisoner. And I've learned a lot. Put me in a position to do that.
Well, in my eyes, I was going to go into the hole as soon as I got to prison because I'm no longer convicted. They can't house me with convicted criminals. That's against the law. And there's people from the county that have to take you back to prison. It's about a two-hour drive.
And I decided that I needed a cigarette, that they needed to give me one, and that I wasn't going to shut up for two hours. And I gave them hell for two hours all the way back to prison. I never got a cigarette. I also didn't go to the hole because the paperwork takes a little time to get there.
So that's a little... I mean, you're not convicted. Why can't they let you out on bond now? I mean, at this point, you've got to... No, they can't.
They can. It did set a new bond. But, I mean, this was just the same day, literally.
You know, so there were... You went all the way back to prison? You didn't go back to, like, the county jail? They just housed you in the county jail?
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Chapter 5: What new evidence led to Russ's exoneration?
Chapter 6: How did Russ cope with life in prison?
And the judge had said that he wasn't going to render his decision that day. But I think he had changed his mind at some point. But we were all outside. Joel, my cousin Mary, a couple friends and I.
or buy somebody's car joel associate nate nate swanson a great guy uh he was up in the courtroom your attorneys are obligated if the prosecution makes any kind of an offer lesson you're saying to me they're obligated to tell you that And obviously Leah Eske got a little nervous. I don't know. But she made an offer to Nate. Nate called down and told Joel.
Joel said that, you know, if I would plead to manslaughter, that she'd give me soft life. I said, she could take that and shove it straight up her ass. And I wasn't going to plead to anything more than a parking ticket. Not even a parking ticket. And I wasn't going to accept anything less than an apology from her. And it was taking a long time. Joel was getting a little nervous.
We since found out that there was a malfunction with the printer. And that's what took the judge so long. But the judge, after writing his brief, and he called us all back to the courtroom, he decided to release his decision. He had a very long statement. about the investigation being more troubling and bringing up more questions than it did answers.
And, uh, he went on for, I don't know, it could have been five minutes. It could have been five hours. Cause I only wanted to hear what he said at the end. And I waited for that. Uh, then there was my two attorneys at my side. And when he came to the end and said, you know, the account to the count of murder at first degree, find you not guilty. And then,
armed criminal action i find you not guilty at that point i was glad that my two attorneys were there because nate swanson well he kind of works out that he's a big strong guy and i didn't have any feeling left in my legs so he was holding me up uh that was one of the best things best days my whole life so then i was truly free you know i'd gotten free a few months prior in june but uh
In November, it was confirmed. I wasn't going to go back to prison ever. That was, that was a big deal. And I got to walk out of there, you know, with my head held high and family and friends support me. And it was just a wonderful day. I thought, you know, this is the beginning of the rest of my life. You know, now I can go about trying to put the pieces of my life back together.
That's what I intended to do.
I mean, it's still, you know, not that you shouldn't be thankful, you know, and grateful, but what a horrific thing to have happened, bro. Like you're just living your life and this is thrust upon you. I mean, it's really a shitty situation and it could have, you know, so easily gone the other way, you know, like you,
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Chapter 8: How did Russ's story highlight issues in the justice system?
She took this man back to her house, and however, she got a bit there, and she unloaded a .38 revolver into five shots and died of cold blood. And when that happened, obviously, police were called. And just so happened, my father knew somebody that lived on the same street, called him at work. And he called me, let me know that M killed somebody. What? That's okay. And I immediately called Joel.
And then I called Chris Hayes from the news. And sure enough, she had shot this gentleman.
y'all obviously like hey you got nothing to worry about you you actually did have something to worry about I did I knew at the time as soon as I found out I knew I said he's going to implicate me in this I don't know why or what I've met this woman before my ordeal like not even a half a dozen times but for whatever reason she hates me
So fair enough, she put a note in this guy's pocket, put some money in his pocket and tried to implicate me. Initially, she said she didn't know anybody named Russ because she had my name on this note. But the police in O'Fallon weren't stupid. They knew of the case and they watched the news and they knew what she was doing.
they're like okay and uh what'd the note say it said something about getting russ's money and how to leave the body outside my mom's house had very instructions like i had wrote the note but it was written real messy like it was written by like two-year-old um and that'll come up here in a minute uh actually that
following weekend i had plans with a friend of mine to go to nearby lake of the ozark which is a couple while a couple of hundred miles west of here uh for a weekend trip so i went out of town for a weekend trip i don't care whatever's gonna happen it's gonna happen and uh i know sugar got there this is a new friend that i made since my ordeal and met at a motorcycle rally and so i explained to this person who i was like you're gonna hang out with me be my friend
You might want to know this about. This is who I am. This is what I've been going through the past several years of my life. And oh, by the way, the person that I was just telling you about that killed my wife, she just killed somebody else the other day. And I'm probably going to get a call from my lawyer sometime this weekend. And this person was flabbergasted. She was like, what? What?
And within five minutes of me facing that conversation, I got a call from Joel Schwartz. He said, well, the police want to question you. I said, yeah, I kind of figured they would. I figured, damn, what do you implicate me in? I says, but again, I'm three hours away and I'm not coming back. I'll be back on Monday. If they want to talk to me, they could talk to me after that.
But I'm going to enjoy my weekend because if I'm getting arrested, I'm going to have fun for a couple of days first. Right. Because at that point, I'm like, you know, she might have done enough to get me arrested again. Who knows? So I enjoyed my weekend and came back and Joel was actually out of town and sent one of his partners to the police station with me to go up there for questioning.
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