Dateline: A Promise to Gloria - A complete timeline of the Gloria Pointer murder case, revisited 

The Dateline episode titled A Promise to Gloria portrayed the tragic murder case of fourteen-year-old Gloria Pointer. As revealed on the Dateline episode, Gloria Pointer was on her way to school on that fateful morning of December 6, 1984, when she was attacked and brutally murdered.

Despite her death being ruled a homicide, investigators were unable to unearth the identity of Gloria Pointer's murderer for three long decades until the use of modern DNA technology pointed them in the direction of the real killer.

Here's everything that you need to know about the case of Gloria Pointer as revealed by Dateline on NBC.

Dateline: Gloria Pointer was murdered on the way to school

Gloria Pointer was born on February 28, 1970, in Cleveland. Her parents separated while she was still young, and she consequently began staying with her mother, Yvonne, who had by then relocated and married another man who had two children who looked up to Gloria as their fond elder sister. Gloria was a beacon of love and support to her family and was also a popular cheerleader at her school. On the day in question, Gloria was supposed to receive a special award at her school owing to her immaculate attendance.

Being excited for her big day, Gloria called up her best friend in the early hours and told her that she'd swing by to obtain a special comb for the occasion. She then left for school at approximately 7 AM. The day was particularly dreary and foggy, and as a result, visibility was generally low. Yvonne and the rest of the family had by then left to sell newspapers in their car, and it was then that Yvonne momentarily spotted Gloria entering a dark alley as a shortcut to her school. She was also spotted by her school friend LaMar Thomas, who later told the police that she was speaking to a man.

Once the ceremony at school began, Gloria was still missing. Eventually, her best friend informed the principal that she hadn't been to her house, and the police were alerted. Unfortunately, the authorities had by then already recovered Gloria's lifeless body from the basement of a nearby building. The cause of her death was determined to be blunt force trauma, and there was evidence of sexual assault as well.

Dateline: DNA evidence matching led to the incarceration of the killer

The investigators were, for a while, under the impression that another convict by the name of Romell Broom was responsible for killing Gloria. However, as recounted by Dateline, modern DNA evidence technology provided a breakthrough in the case when, in 2013, it was conclusively determined that, based on the DNA evidence collected from Gloria's clothes and the crime scene, the killer was fifty-eight-year-old Hernandez Warren.

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Warren was already a convicted rapist and was twenty-nine years old when he committed Gloria's murder.

Dateline is available exclusively on NBC.

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