Authorities in New York have charged a suspect in a case that began more than a decade ago with the discovery of multiple bodies near Gilgo Beach on Long Island, alleging that he killed three of the 11 people whose remains were found in the area, court documents show.
The arrest of 59-year-old Rex A. Heuermann marks the first major movement in an investigation that has captivated New York residents since authorities found the remains of four women in the area near Gilgo Beach in 2010.
Like dozens of other true-crime stories – and fears of an unnamed serial killer – the killings have been the subject of a book, podcast and movie, but until today remained largely cold. An attorney for Heuermann confirmed that he was representing the suspect but made no other comment.
Here’s what you need to know.
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The facts
In May 2010, 23-year-old, Shannan Gilbert, went missing while working in Oak Beach, N.Y., authorities said. Police soon began looking near Gilbert’s last known location, in a cluster of remote Long Island seaside towns.
While looking for Gilbert in December 2010, police found the remains of four other women, all who died in their 20s. The women, known as the Gilgo Beach Four, were last seen alive between 2007 and 2010.
Between March and April 2011, police found six additional sets of remains in the same area – four women, a male and a toddler, bringing the total number of remains found in the area to 11.
One set of remains matched partial remains found in November 2000 in Manorville, N.Y. Another matched partial remains found in 1996 on Fire Island. Beyond geography, it remains unclear which of the remains are connected except the four found together in December 2010.
In a bid to reopen the case, Suffolk County police announced in 2020 that they had found a belt years earlier that they believed the suspect had handled that bears the initials “W H” or “H M.” In 2022, they started an interagency task force dedicated to the case, including the FBI, state and local police, district attorney and sheriff’s office.
Investigators first homed in on Heuermann in March 2022 after finding that a Chevrolet Avalanche linked by a witness to one of the killings had been registered in his name at the time of her death, according to a court document. Authorities say they later found cellphone bills for Heuermann that corresponded to the dates and locations of the killer’s contact with the four victims found together. The records included calls scheduling meetings with three of the four.
According to the bail application, an email account linked to Heuermann was used to search online about investigators’ progress through June 2023. “No one knows what you do when you operate a grand jury proceeding,” said District Attorney Raymond A. Tierney at a news conference Friday. “We were playing before a party of one because we knew the person responsible would be looking at us.”
The female victims were bound in a camouflage burlap at the head, midsection and later at the legs, Tierney said Friday.
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The suspect
Heuermann is an architect who has lived much of his life in Massapequa Park, N.Y., on Long Island. His firm’s website says he has worked for tenants at John F. Kennedy International Airport and presented before the New York City Landmark Preservation Commission since founding the company in 1994.
The actor Billy Baldwin said on Twitter on Friday that he attended Berner High School with Heuermann, graduating in 1981. Heuermann said in an interview with a YouTuber last year that he was “born and raised on Long Island” and has worked in Manhattan since 1987.
In the court document released Friday, Heuermann is described as searching on the internet for “sadistic materials, … images of the victims and their relatives.” He also allegedly performed counter-surveillance of the investigation and had guns, the document said. Heuermann also allegedly used one of several burner phones registered under his name to make “taunting calls” to a relative of one of the victims, it said.
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The victims
The four women whose remains police found in proximity while searching for Gilbert were Melissa Barthelemy, 24; Megan Waterman, 22; Amber Lynn Costello, 27; and Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25.
Law enforcement found two other women’s remains, Jessica Taylor and Valerie Mack, 24, near Gilgo Beach in 2011. Police had also found partial remains that they think belonged to Mack, whose family last saw her in 2000, in Manorville, N.Y. They connected the two findings using DNA evidence, identifying her in 2020.
Authorities have yet to publicly identify the remaining victims potentially associated with the case. The final two bodies found along Ocean Parkway belonged to a toddler and male police say was between 17 and 23 years old when he died. Investigators also found remains in Nassau County of the toddler’s mother and an additional woman, both of whom police connected to remains discovered in 1996 and 1997.
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The background
For 10 years, police had made little headway in the homicide investigation. In the meantime, the story became a cultural phenomenon.
Many in the public obsessed with figuring out the killer’s motives and questioned why the police couldn’t identify the person, eventually leading to a seven-part podcast looking into the investigation that was hosted by two journalists and native Long Islanders. As with the trial of Alex Murdaugh, Netflix put out a true-crime drama, this one called “Lost Girls,” focusing on the search for Shannan Gilbert.
The same day the trailer for the Netflix film was released, a relatively new police chief disclosed that authorities had found the belt years earlier, and opened up a new website to push for tips from the community and gather case information in one place.
Last year, police also released the 2010 911 call tapes from Gilbert, who was calling from inside the home of a client.
“There is somebody after me,” she can be heard saying. “Somebody’s after me – please.”
Americans have long had a fascination for following brutal serial killings and mysterious true crimes. Many of the killers have films, podcasts and books written about them, and many have gone years without being found.
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What’s next
Though authorities did not charge Heuermann in Brainard-Barnes’s death, they wrote in an application to hold Heuermann without bail that he is the prime suspect in her case, which they expect to “resolve soon.”
In 2017, law enforcement said a man convicted of different murders on Long Island could be connected to some of these killings, but it is not clear whether police still believe that to be the case.
Heuermann was arrested Thursday night around 8:30 p.m., according to the district attorney, and a grand jury indictment was anticipated to be released around the time of the 4 p.m. news conference.
(c) 2023, Bloomberg · Katia Porzecanski
Flimsy evidence. No real case here. People die all the time. Case dismissed.
Why do you persist in displaying photos of known or potential רשעים??? PLEASE take down the picture of the alleged muderer. In the name of every sane reader of this website, thank you (if you do it, that is…).