McInerney died in 2006 without facing justice, family says
The Chicago Police Department on Monday identified Thomas McInerney, a former Chicago homicide detective and U.S. Army veteran, as the man who abducted and fatally shot eight-year-old Gloria Kowalewicz in November 1960, ending a 65-year investigation. McInerney, who lived around the corner from the Kowalewicz family, had joined the Chicago force the year before the killing. He died in 2006 at age 70, two decades before authorities made the identification public.
Gloria was last seen alive on the morning of November 12, 1960, walking from her family’s West Englewood home to a nearby church for mass, according to a CPD statement released Monday. Someone abducted her along the way and fatally shot her; her body was found hours later in a ditch at a forest preserve southwest of the city.
Police said investigators recovered several pieces of evidence at the scene — including a bullet, her coat and a white communion purse containing a prayer book — and lifted a fingerprint from the strap of that purse. A task force, joined by firefighters, Boy Scouts and military veterans, searched for the girl’s killer in the days after her death. The task force interviewed about 1,300 people and gave a dozen lie-detector tests, but identified no suspect at the time.
That changed earlier this year, when DNA submitted to a family-tree website enabled the FBI to match McInerney to the scene of the murder, according to the Chicago Tribune, which first reported the development in a lengthy article on Sunday. The killing, which shocked the city, was solved more than six decades after the fact. The CPD said further DNA, fingerprint and ballistic testing established McInerney as Gloria’s killer. The agency’s Monday statement said it hoped the news “brings a measure of closure to all who knew Gloria and her story.”
McInerney joined the Chicago force in 1959, according to his obituary, which was published after his death on August 30, 2006. He was about to turn 25 at the time of Gloria’s murder. He retired from the agency in 1987 as a homicide investigator and then worked as an investigator for the federal public defender’s offices in Las Vegas and Reno, retiring from those positions in 2004. His obituary cited “numerous commendations during his years with the [CPD]” and noted he had been recognized as outstanding federal defender investigator in 2003. He was described as a husband, father to two sons and three daughters, and grandfather to a dozen children.
The CPD statement observed that Gloria’s parents died without ever learning who had murdered their daughter. “McInerney should have never worn the CPD star,” the statement said. “And it is devastating to accept that he was never identified and held accountable while he was alive.” The agency called the killing “abhorrent,” saying the perpetrator “not only took the life of an eight-year-old child – but left … all who knew and loved her shattered as they searched for answers.”
Gloria’s brother, Adam Kowalewicz, told the Chicago Tribune that the identification came as a relief, but said he was frustrated that McInerney had died without being made to face justice. “He never paid his dues,” Adam Kowalewicz told the outlet. “You hope he’s going to pay his dues with the good lord.”