Rex Heuermann Update: 3 Key Developments in Gilgo Beach Serial Killer Case
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Authorities returned to the Long Island home of the alleged Gilgo Beach serial killer on Monday as the investigation into Rex Heuermann continues.
The search of the Massapequa Park home comes months after Heuermann was charged in a series of unsolved murders of four prostitutes found dead in 2010. Heuermann faces charges in connection to the murders of Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman, Amber Lynn Costello and Maureen Brainard-Barnes – also known as “The Gilgo Four.”
Heuermann, 60, who has pleaded not guilty to the charges, is expected to appear in court on June 18 for a status hearing in Suffolk County Criminal Court. No trial date has been set.
James Carbone/Getty
At least half a dozen law enforcement agents were spotted in Heuermann’s driveway on Monday. Cars, including state trooper vans, lined the street along the Massapequa Park neighborhood. Some officers wore gloves. Others carried white cardboard boxes into the home, as seen in videos on social media.
Authorities are executing another search warrant at the home of Rex Heuermann. Looks like Asa and the kids packed up and left quietly before this happened.
I thought the home was already searched thoroughly. Wonder what they are looking for now. 👀 #LISK pic.twitter.com/tCyqJl26UG
— Rose (@901Lulu) May 20, 2024
The New York State Police told Newsweek it would not comment on the situation. The Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office did not respond immediately to Newsweek’s request for comment.
Heuermann’s wife Asa Ellerup, who filed for divorce last summer shortly after his arrest, along with their adult children were not home at the time of the search, according to lawyer Bob Macedonio, as reported by Fox News.
The site of law enforcement swarming the area on Monday was a familiar one for neighbors who saw their normally quiet street become a media frenzy after Heuermann’s arrest in July.
“Most people don’t knock on his door,” Barry Auslander, one of Heuermann’s neighbors, told Newsweek in a previous interview. “During Halloween, the kids are told to stay away. He’s not a very nice person.”
YUKI IWAMURA/Getty
Who is Rex Heuermann?
Heuermann graduated from the same local high school as actor Billy Baldwin who tweeted after the news broke about his 1981 classmate’s arrest, describing it as “mind-boggling.”
After getting a bachelor’s degree from the New York Institute of Technology, Heuermann started his architecture firm RH Consultants in 1994. He did most of his architectural work in New York City, according to a company biography and the firm’s website.
Heuermann is currently being held at the Riverhead Correctional Facility in Suffolk County, about 50 miles from his home.
Suffolk County Sheriff Dr. Errol Toulon Jr. said Heuermann busies himself with reading books, reading his discovery, watching TV and sleeping, according to an Oxygen article.
He has been separated from other inmates “for his safety,” according to the article. Toulon called him “very compliant.”
The search for a serial killer unfolds
The hunt for a possible serial killer started in 2010 when 11 sets of human remains were discovered along a property on Gilgo Beach in Suffolk County. Law enforcement first started searching along Ocean Parkway after Shannan Gilbert, a 24-year-old sex worker from New Jersey, vanished in 2010.
The search first turned up the remains of Barthelemy, Waterman, Lynn Costello and Brainard-Barnes. All the women were in their mid-20s.
Police found other remains during the search, including those that belonged to Jessica Taylor and Valerie Mack, who were also in their 20s when they had gone missing years earlier.
Other remains discovered included those of a female toddler, an Asian male, an unidentified woman who was believed to be the toddler’s mother and another woman identified as 34-year-old Karen Vergata who went missing in 1996.
Gilbert was found in late 2011, after the other 10 victims were found.
The case has long mystified police, and it captured the public’s attention when Netflix released a film in 2020 called Lost Girls that was based on the murders.
Detectives finally nabbed Heuermann in 2023 after he tossed a pizza box with leftover crust into a Manhattan trash can. The DNA from the crust matched genetic material found on the women’s remains.
Heuermann didn’t allegedly just kill these women; he tormented their families. Prosecutors revealed he used a victim’s cellphone to taunt her family with chilling calls. In one, he admitted to the murder. All the while, he obsessively searched for updates on the investigation, trying to hide his identity online.
One of his searches: “Why hasn’t the Long Island serial killer been caught?”
Investigators dug deep into Heuermann’s life using subpoenas and search warrants. They discovered that his cellphone frequently pinged in the same areas and at the same times as prepaid anonymous cellphones used to contact Barthelemy, Costello, and Waterman. Shockingly, the “burner” phones and Heuermann’s phone often traveled together.
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