It was a string of grisly, unsolved murders that recorded the general public’s attention, putting homeowners of Long Island, New York, on edge.
Now, on Friday, authorities in the United States have actually revealed they have actually charged a suspect in a minimum of 3 of the deaths, offering possible responses to a longstanding secret.
Detectives have actually implicated Nassau County designer Rex Heuermann, 59, in the killings of Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello.
He stays an individual of interest in a 4th murder, that of Maureen Brainard-Barnes. She was discovered bound and concealed in the brush in 2010 beside a beach highway.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Rex Heuermann is a satanic force that strolls amongst us– a predator that messed up households,” Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison stated. “If not for the members of this job force, he would still be out on the streets today.”
Defence legal representative Michael Brown, nevertheless, stated Heuermann informed him, “I didn’t do this.” Heuermann, through his attorney, has actually gotten in a plea of innocent.
Provided the “severe wickedness” of the case, Suffolk County Judge Richard Ambro bought Heuermann to be kept in prison without bail.
The examination started over a years back, in May 2010, when 24-year-old Shannan Gilbert vanished after making a worried call to emergency situation services.
“There’s someone after me,” she stated in the recording, as she left a home on Oak Beach, Long Island, where she had actually been worked with for sex work.
Her disappearance triggered a cops search, which extended on for months. In December of that year, on a separated beach along Long Island’s south coast, an officer came throughout a set of remains: Barthelemy’s.
Over the next couple of days, more bodies were found, coming from Costello, Brainard-Barnes and Waterman. The ladies were all young– in their 20s– and all had actually been used in sex work. Their remains were discovered covered in camouflage burlap-style material.
As the search continued into 2011, the body count would increase to 11, with an extra 4 ladies, one guy and a young child discovered. Authorities have actually stated that they think several individuals to be accountable.
According to detectives, Heuermann lived throughout the bay from the Gilgo Beach criminal offense scene, in a location called Massapequa Park.
Investigators started to concentrate on him as a suspect in March 2022, when they found he had actually owned a Chevrolet Avalanche pick-up truck, comparable to the design a witness had actually determined around the time of the disappearances.
A monitoring group later on that month routed Heuermann as he got rid of some remaining pizza crust while in Manhattan. Investigators then gathered the crust and swabbed it for DNA, which connected him to hair recuperated amongst the victims’ bodies.
Authorities apprehended Heuermann late on Thursday, and by Friday early morning, private investigators were sweeping his little red home in Long Island.
Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney informed press reporters on Friday that Heuermann had “browsed fanatically” for info online about the Gilgo Beach killings.
Till his arrest, Tierney stated the designer utilized burner phones to get in touch with sex employees. He likewise kept in mind that Heuermann presumably had licenses for 92 weapons.
“This case is not over,” Tierney stated at Friday’s interview. “It’s just starting.”
The Gilgo Beach murders have actually drawn extensive spotlight over the last few years, in the wake of the Netflix series Lost Girls and true-crime podcasts dissecting the case.
As she went to Long Island on Friday, New York Governor Kathy Hochul stated she hoped the arrest would assist bring closure to the victims’ enjoyed ones.
“This is a day that is a very long time in coming and ideally a day that will bring peace to this neighborhood and to the households– peace that has actually been long past due,” she stated.
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Al Jazeera and news firms