Eight grieving families got answers Wednesday when Rex Heuermann, accused of being the Long Island serial killer, admitted at the Arthur M. Cromarty Court Complex in Suffolk County, New York. of murdering eight young women.
The 62-year-old Massapequa, Long Island resident pleaded guilty to killing Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Megan Waterman, 22, Amber Costello, 27, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25, Jessica Taylor, 20, Valerie Mack, 24, and Sandra Costilla, 28, over the course of nearly 20 years. Heuermann also confessed to the murder with which he had not yet been charged: Karen Vergata, 34, who disappeared in 1996. Her remains were only identified through genetic genealogy in 2023. Heuermann had originally pleaded not guilty to all seven murders and was scheduled to go on trial in September.
He agreed to multiple life sentences without the possibility of parole and waived his right to appeal in exchange for no further charges being filed in connection with the eight victims. He also agreed to be interviewed by the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit. The sentence will be announced on June 17th.
Arrest and evidence
Heuermann, a former architect, was arrested outside his Manhattan office in July 2023 and initially charged with the murders of Barthelemy, Waterman and Costello. Over the next two years, as police built their case against him, additional charges were added for the murders of Brainard-Barnes, Taylor, Mack and Costilla. He was held without bail; a 32-page court document laid out the wealth of evidence that led to his arrest.
Bail was denied because of the “heinous nature” of the crimes, prosecutors wrote, citing how long it took to catch Heuermann. The document also highlighted “its recent [Internet-]Searches for sadistic content, child pornography and images of the victims and their relatives, as well as his access to firearms.
Prosecutors also found DNA evidence linking Heuermann to crime scenes, as well as documents detailing previous murders and possible problems that could have led to his capture – including “blood stains” and “DNA,” the BBC reported. Heuermann also had records of killing methods and findings from previous murders; Investigators seized hundreds of electronic devices from his home as well as 300 firearms.
Decades at large
The Long Island serial killer captivated the state for decades – from 1993 to 2011, when the bodies of young women turned up on Gilgo Beach on Long Island’s south coast. In May 2010, Shannan Gilbert, a sex worker in the area, disappeared, prompting police to search the beach. Gilbert’s body was not initially found, but in December 2010, officers discovered the remains of Brainard-Barnes, Barthelemy, Waterman and Costello, who became known as “The Gilgo Four.” Each of the women was wrapped in camouflage-colored sackcloth and was found in the same area, not far from the Parkway. All were petite women in their 20s who had offered sexual services through Craigslist. (Gilbert’s remains were discovered in 2011; however, whether she was murdered is disputed. The Suffolk County Police Department is treating her death as accidental.)
Over the next decade, the investigation stalled as the authorities involved became embroiled in scandals. In 2022, Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney created a new task force to reopen the case and was able to link Heuermann to a pickup truck that a witness had seen one of his victims get into in 2010. Investigators also managed to match his DNA to hair found on one of the bodies – after recovering a discarded pizza crust from a trash can in midtown Manhattan, where he worked.
Cell phone data ultimately helped investigators further narrow down the Long Island resident: Heuermann had used Barthelemy’s own phone after her death to harass her family. He also taunted the victims’ relatives with calls from a prepaid cell phone – which he had purchased with his personal credit card, which put the police on his trail. He used his personal phone to check one of the disposable email accounts he used to contact sex workers and googled his own crimes through one of those accounts. “[Dieses] “The email account was also used to search for a number of podcasts and/or documentaries related to this investigation, as well as to repeatedly view hundreds of images of the murdered victims and their immediate family members,” prosecutors wrote. “Significantly, defendant Heuermann also searched for and viewed articles about the very task force that was investigating him.”
Voices of relatives
“I’m grateful for the work that’s been done, grateful that this day is coming and hopeful for the future,” Jasmine Robinson, Taylor’s cousin, previously told CBS News. “I hope she is remembered for the beautiful young woman she was – not for what she did for a living at the time. She is loved and missed every day.”
Allie Pertel, Waterman’s sister, told the station that she felt “anger and relief at the same time. It’s all starting over again. She was a vulnerable, naive girl with a drug addiction who was very easily influenced by this monster of a man.”
Costello’s aunt, Bonnie Sasse, called her niece “a sweet, loving, generous young woman. She just went down the wrong path,” adding, “We, the family members of these poor victims, never thought we would see this day. I rejoice. I know they do too.”
