Chicago Police Say One of Their Own Killed 8-Year-Old Gloria Kowalewicz in 1960

Chicago police say they have identified the man who killed 8-year-old Gloria Kowalewicz in 1960, and that he was one of their own: Thomas F. McInerney Jr., an officer who later became a detective and retired from the department in 1987.

McInerney died in 2006 at age 70 in Las Vegas, police said, according to NBC News and CBS News Chicago.

“McInerney should never have worn the CPD star, and it is devastating to accept that he was never identified and held accountable while he was alive,” the Chicago Police Department said in a statement on Monday, Oct. 12, 2026.

A walk to church

Gloria was abducted on Nov. 12, 1960, while walking to church on the city’s South Side. She was shot twice in the head, and her body was found in a forest preserve southwest of Chicago.

Investigators at the time collected and preserved a bullet, her coat, her shoes and her white communion purse, which held her prayer book, police said. They also lifted a fingerprint from the strap of the purse. More than a thousand people were questioned, but the case went unsolved.

How the case was solved

Advances in DNA technology, combined with the preserved fingerprint, led investigators to McInerney this year, police said. The department’s Forensic Services division worked with the Illinois State Police and the FBI, CBS News Chicago reported.

McInerney had joined the department in 1959, the year before the killing, police said.

“His abhorrent actions not only took the life of an 8-year-old child, but left her parents and all who knew and loved her shattered as they searched for answers,” the department said. Gloria’s parents have since died.

McInerney never stood trial, and the police findings have not been tested in court.