In February 2006, Lyon County, Iowa Sheriff Blythe Bloemendaal identified the woman known for 27 years as Jane Doe as Wilma Nissen. VanGammeren's arrest for perjury is one more twist in the Northwest Iowa mystery.
For 31 years, Lyon County, Iowa investigators have worked to figure out why a 23-year-old woman who was missing her jaw and most of her teeth ended up dead in a ditch in Northwest Iowa. Just two years ago, Lyon County Sheriff Blythe Bloemendaal exhumed Nissen's grave to look for clues in the cold case.
"We're going to do everything we can to solve this crime. This is one shot we haven't taken yet, and we're going to fire it," Bloemendaal said on September 18, 2007.
Twenty-three months later, the Lyon County Sheriff has VanGammeren in custody. Investigators say the 82-year-old from Inwood lied to them during questioning about the Nissen case. He's now charged with six counts of felony perjury. Court papers say VanGammeren lied about arranging strippers for a bachelor party, having prostitutes at his home and transporting "a stripper or prositute" from Sioux Falls to his house in Iowa.
That's important to the case because when authorities identified Nissen more than three years ago, it was because they found her fingerprints in an FBI database from California where she was arrested for prostitution.
And while authorities aren't saying anything else about VanGammeren's arrest, Sheriff Bloemendaal has said in the past he's committed to solving this case.
"This is a homicide. We will not let it sit in the back corner," Bloemendaal said on September 18, 2007.
VanGammeren will be in court in Rock Rapids on Wednesday.
The Lyon County Sheriff's Office has created a special Web site for anyone who has information about the Wilma Nissen Cold Case.
