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Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Daily Mail
Gilgo Beach suspect's loyal ex-wife skips key hearing as expert raises serious questions about DNA evidence
The loyal ex-wife of the alleged Gilgo Beach serial killer has skipped a key hearing - as an expert raises serious questions about DNA evidence being used in the case. Asa Ellerup has continued to attend her ex-husband Rex Heuermann's court hearings despite their divorce in April. But on Tuesday the mother of two was nowhere in sight. Ellerup's attorney Robert Macedonio said there was 'no specific reason' why she was not present at court, and did not want to comment further. Ellerup, who was married to Heuermann for 27 years and shared two children - Victoria, 27 and Christopher, 35, before she filed for divorce after his arrest in July 2023. On Tuesday, Suffolk County Criminal court heard from Nathaniel Adams, a systems engineer with Forensics Bioinformantics Services, a biotechnology company based in Fairborn, Ohio. Adams told the court that the IBDGem software that was used by the prosecution's star witness Richard 'Ed' Green, Phd, a biomolecular engineer and co-founder of Astrea Labs, who testified in April, did not appear to follow a formal discipline that would confirm if the software was dependable or not. Using a powerpoint presentation, Adams spoke about the 'zone of chaos' when defects occur in the early or mid-development stages, but explained aren't caught until late development or post -release. 'All of these defects can exist and can manifest in serious problems and not be apparent to the users. They may not know that there is an error occurring.' He noted that the IBDGem software used by Astrea Labs followed 'no quailty control framework.' One operational concern he spoke about was when the Astrea team had a reed sample in the lab that returned challenging results. Adams concluded that if the team had a standardized processes in place that would not have taken place. 'You don't want bad software getting involved in the process,' he said. 'Formal and regular inspections of software prevents the zone of chaos from taking place.' He further testified that there were 65 total edits - also known as commits - made on the IBDGem software since June 2020, 15 edits and four new updated versions, also called 'releases' since March 2023. He explained that IBDGem software is not the same one that tested the data sample used in the case, and said Green's team adjusted the code after they did testing on the case adding that 'the (software) release was done after the testing.' When defense attorney Danielle Coyosh asked Adams if these tests are not completed right can the system still be considered valid and verified, he responded, 'No, by definition it is unreliable.' The defense witness also pointed that Green's team are scientists and don't use the same type of validity in developing code and software to do the scientific analysis as a systems engineer would. The 38-year-old Adams who has an associate's degree in systems engineering and bachelors in computer science said he was still working on obtaining his Master's degree and working towards his master's thesis. However, Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney appeared to mock Adams and questioned his credibility during his grueling two hour cross-examination. Tierney took apart his 10-page CV asking him why it took nearly 10 years for him to obtain his college degrees. At one point, Judge Timothy Mazzei intervened and asked Adams' what was going on between 2004 to 2011?' His response to the judge was that he had 'various jobs' but didn't elaborate. During the cross-examination, the DA asked the witness why he only listed 12 cases on is his CV if he was acted as an expert witness for the defense in 30 cases. He also asked if he graduated with honors, and if had any other industry experience besides working for his current employer. He also inquired about the journals and publication Adams had published in and the conferences he presented at. 'You're supposed to be an expert, but you don't even know who your adviser was or if you graduated summa cum laude or not,' Tierney said. The expert witness will return to the stand on Wednesday for day two of the hearing. Tuesday's hearing comes exactly one week after the three-part Peacock documentary The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets first aired. The documentary reveals never-before-heard admissions from Heuermann's family and of a man accused of living a double life. In a bombshell twist, Victoria admits to producers that she believes her father 'most likely' committed the murders though her mother steadfastly defends her ex-husband's innocence. She came to her own conclusion after she reviewed the facts that were available on the case and what was explained to her. She shared the revelation with producers, a week before the series launch. Though she did not speak about in the documentary, it was revealed in a statement at the end of the final episode. Melissa Barthelemy (top left), Amber Costello (top right), Megan Waterman (bottom left), and Maureen Brainard-Barnes (bottom right) became known as the 'Gilgo Four' Valerie Mack (left) disappeared in 2000 and parts of her body were discovered in Long Island that November. Jessica Taylor (right) vanished in 2003 with some of her remains being found in Manorville that year Sandra Costilla (left) was murdered in 1993, making her the earliest known alleged victim. Karen Vergata's (right) remains were identified in 2023. Heuermann has not been charged in connection to her death Heuermann has been charged with the murders of seven women during a two-decade reign of horror from 1993 to 2011. All the victims were sex workers who vanished before their remains were found along Ocean Parkway near Gilgo Beach as well as other remote spots on Long Island. Since his arrest, prosecutors have unveiled a trove of evidence, including hairs allegedly belonging to Heuermann and his family members found on some of the victims, cellphone data allegedly placing him in contact with them, and a chilling 'planning document' in which he allegedly outlines his killings in detail. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. Fears that a serial killer or killers were operating on Long Island began in May 2010 when 24-year-old sex worker Shannan Gilbert disappeared in strange circumstances one night. During a search for Gilbert that December, officers found the body of Melissa Barthelemy, 22, in the marshes by Gilgo Beach. Within days, three more bodies - Amber Costello, 27, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25, and Megan Waterman, 22 - had been found. They became known as the Gilgo Four. Over the following months, the remains of seven other victims were found. Earlier this year, Tanya Denise Jackson, 26, also known as Peaches, and her two-year-old daughter Tatiana Marie Dykes were identified this year. Their deaths have not been linked to Heuermann.
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Daily Mail
Inside Asa Ellerup and Gilgo Beach suspect husband Rex Heuermann's marriage, and why she still loves him
Asa Ellerup breaks into a smile as she remembers her husband Rex Heuermann revealing that he had a 'big surprise' waiting at home. It was July 2009 and Ellerup had gone to Iceland for five weeks to visit family with her two children, Victoria and Christopher. Heuermann stayed behind on Long Island, saying he was busy with work at his Midtown Manhattan architecture firm. 'He said to me: "I made a big mess,"' Ellerup beams fondly in the new Peacock docuseries 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets'. Heuermann had gutted the basement bathroom, totally remodeling it from the tiles to the toilet. 'That was Rex. He's a problem solver,' she says of her beloved husband of 27 years. To Ellerup, this was a romantic gesture from a doting family man, her 'tall, dark and handsome hero who had taken her and Christopher in when she was a young, single mother working at a 7-Eleven. But, according to authorities, it was something far darker: a calculated move by a suspected serial killer intent on covering his tracks and destroying forensic evidence of the murder of a young woman inside his own home. Another 14 years would pass before Heuermann, now 61, was arrested in July 2023 and later charged with murdering seven women - many of them sex workers -between 1993 and 2010. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial. Prosecutors allege in court documents that he lured victims to his house when his wife and children were away. It was during Ellerup's July 2009 visit to Iceland - and Heuermann's sudden surprise bathroom makeover - when Melissa Barthelemy went missing. Barthelemy, 24, told a friend she was going to meet a client and was never seen alive again. Her remains were found in December 2010 wrapped in burlap along Ocean Parkway, near Gilgo Beach, beside three other victims. In the days following her disappearance, Barthelemy's teenage sister received taunting calls from her sibling's phone. The male caller branded Barthelemy a 'whore' and gloated he had 'killed her'. The calls stopped when Heuermann flew out to join his family in Iceland. Inside the remodeled bathroom, where Barthelemy may have died, Ellerup appears more upset at the state in which investigators left it than by the horrors that might have happened there. 'They took it - brand new,' she says in the show, gesturing to where the door used to be. 'They ripped it up looking for trace evidence of blood,' she adds, as the camera reveals a panel in the bathtub cut out during a police search. A family rift The docuseries marks the first time that Heuermann's relatives have spoken publicly since his arrest - and it exposes an explosive split at the home over his potential guilt. Throughout the episodes, Ellerup doesn't waver in her belief that the man she married could ever be a serial killer. She lights up when talking about their lives together, proudly referring to him as her 'hero' and takes issue with the suggestion that he used sex workers. 'They're telling me that he was soliciting sex with sex workers? I don't have sex with my husband? I don't satisfy him?' she asks incredulously. 'He comes home, he eats my dinner. It's not good enough? No, I don't believe my husband did this.' Even after Heuermann has spent two years behind bars, Ellerup describes seeing him at court hearings as 'comforting' and likens her prison visits to going 'on a first date'. When confronted with DNA, timelines, his chilling computer hard drive and cellphone data, she refuses to consider that the allegations are true. 'I would need to hear it from Rex, face-to-face, for me to believe he killed these girls,' she says. Meanwhile, their daughter Victoria, 28, is less certain. In a bombshell moment, after reviewing case files, she admits to having reached the gut-wrenching conclusion that her father is 'most likely' the notorious Gilgo Beach serial killer. Attorney Bob Macedonio, who represents Ellerup, tells the Daily Mail that 'time will only tell' if she will ever accept she may have been married to an alleged serial killer for almost three decades. 'After Victoria viewed the information and after it was explained to her, she was able to process and form her own opinion that her father most likely is the Gilgo beach serial killer,' Macedonio says. 'Asa, on the other hand, maintains the belief that Rex, the father of her children and her ex-husband of 27 years, is not capable of committing these horrific acts.' But attorney John Ray isn't convinced by Ellerup's denials. Ray represented some of the victims' families and, for years, kept attention on the case - loudly criticizing the investigation when it was being hampered by corrupt law enforcement. He tells the Daily Mail that he finds it hard to believe that mother and daughter are living under the same roof while being at odds over Heuermann's guilt. 'You mean to tell me that they are just happily getting along?' he questions. 'One person said my husband did not slaughter women and chop them up in that house or anywhere, and the other one says yes he did. 'They made it sound like an academic debate. It is impossible for those two people to live together and not have a completely dramatic falling out if they maintain those positions.' Ray also doubts Heuermann's family didn't know what the man they lived with was allegedly doing. 'It's a sham,' he says, adding that Ellerup's outright denial and Victoria's turmoil before reaching her conclusion is all about them 'creating [their] innocence' in the case. 'They are both very cleverly distancing themselves from any responsibility to what happened - and that is a consistent theme.' In the Peacock series, Ellerup and Victoria say they didn't notice any signs of Heuermann's alleged crimes and they have not been accused of having any information prior to his arrest. Horror in the family home But regardless of how much they may wish to distance themselves, the women in Heuermann's life have been thrust into the heart of the case. While his family is not suspected of any involvement in the crimes, the home where Ellerup, Heuermann, Victoria and Christopher shared so many family memories is also believed to be the place where other families' sisters, daughters and mothers took their last breaths. In the docuseries, the two women are seen in the basement where authorities believe victims were held, tortured and killed. As a child growing up in the home with his parents, the basement was a space where a young Heuermann had his bedroom. As an adult living there with his wife and children, it became the site of a large gun vault - and, inside that, a hidden room that no one else was ever allowed to enter. The vault - dubbed the 'kill room' - was a focal point in the police searches. A chilling planning document found on Heuermann's computer hard drive allegedly indicated it was where his victims died. Heuermann's wife and daughter have also been unwittingly allegedly linked to several of the murdered women through DNA evidence. Hairs found on six of the seven murdered women have allegedly been matched to Heuermann, Ellerup Victoria or a woman he lived with between 1990 and 1993. According to prosecutors, hairs belonging to Victoria were found on the bodies of victims Amber Costello and Valerie Mack. Victoria was just three years old when her father allegedly murdered and dismembered Mack in 2000. Despite DNA evidence thrusting Ellerup and Victoria into Heuermann's criminal case, according to criminal defense attorney Sam Bassett, the family's public comments could impact whether they are called as witnesses. While witnesses cannot testify about their 'general opinions', Bassett says - if he were Heuermann's defense attorney - he would be paying attention to what Victoria and Ellerup say about his innocence or guilt. 'It could impact their testimony on cross-examination for example if the daughter takes the stand and says: 'I think he's absolutely innocent.' Then they could be cross-examined on any contradictory statements they made in the documentary,' he tells the Daily Mail. However, while Victoria's belief may make her an unfavorable witness to the defense, Bassett believes she is unlikely to be called anyway, due to her age at the time of the killings. Ellerup, meanwhile, married Heuermann two years after he allegedly killed his first victim, Sandra Costilla. A fairytale love story Ellerup looks back fondly on her love story with the man now accused of being a serial killer. She was 18 and working in a 7-Eleven when she first met the 'tall, dark and handsome' college boy. Despite being 'madly in love', both Ellerup and Heuermann ended up marrying other people. Ellerup reveals her first marriage 'did not go well at all', and that her ex-husband 'became somebody completely different' after their son Christopher was born. When she tried to seek a divorce, she says he 'wasn't very nice about it' and made it clear he wouldn't accept her being happy with someone else. The way Ellerup tells it, Heuermann was something of a knight in shining armor, accompanying her to pick up her son and helping to take her ex-husband to court. 'So fast forward, I got my divorce. There was no reason to hold back. You know what I mean?' she says of her relationship with Heuermann, smiling. Following her divorce, Heuermann took her and Christopher into his home. Not long later, Ellerup became pregnant with Victoria and the couple married in 1995. 'There's a picture of me and I'm looking up going: "I finally got him. He's mine,"' she says, thinking back on their wedding day. Ellerup describes their love story like a fairytale - where Heuermann rescued her and they lived happily ever after. 'He's my hero,' she says. Choosing 'weak wives' Dr Gail Saltz, clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College, tells the Daily Mail that serial killers deliberately choose certain types of spouses - 'weak wives who are malleable, with low self esteem, who will believe or at least go along with what they say and can be controlled. 'Mostly they marry docile, passive, controllable partners. Partners who won't question them or push back,' she says. 'The wife may, for her own needs, feel her husband is good and decent because believing he is a murderer would make being with him intolerable and she needs him.' Besides a troubled first marriage and life as a young single mother, Ellerup - who was adopted from Iceland - had suffered other traumas at the hands of men. She was sexually assaulted by a classmate aged 16 and tried to kill herself. At 19, she narrowly escaped a kidnapping attempt by hiding in a dumpster for hours. As well as choosing someone who 'needs' him, Saltz says that serial killers also often marry 'to keep an appearance of normalcy to the outside world, to look non-suspicious, more than actually having a real relationship'. And, for 27 years, Heuermann appeared to do just that, keeping up the act of being a loving 'family man' as the couple lived something of a typical suburban family life on Long Island. They raised their children in the popular commuter town of Massapequa Park while he traveled into the city to work as an architect. How could you not know? Ellerup insists that she never saw any signs that her husband was leading a double life. 'I know what bad men are capable of doing,' she says. 'I've seen it, and I've heard it from other men. Not my husband. You have the wrong man.' Victoria also insists her dad was never violent. The biggest display of rage she ever saw was when he threw plates into the sink after what she believed were stressful days at work. Still, Ellerup faces skepticism about whether she truly knew nothing of her husband's alleged crimes. 'How could you not know? How could you not know that your husband was a serial killer?' Ellerup says. 'Know what? My husband was home. He is a family man,' she insists. It's a question Kerri Rawson, the daughter of BTK serial killer Dennis Rader, says she and her mother have heard a 'million times'. 'I understand having reasonable questions. Is she in denial? Is she lying? Is she disassociated?' Rawson says in the show. 'The thing is, when you're sitting in the cheap seats with the popcorn, you're in hindsight-land… you're not sitting in the everyday with a normal man.' She says that people underestimate 'the control' and 'manipulation' in such situations. While Rawson and her mother never saw signs of her father's double life, they accepted his guilt after he was arrested. 'No matter what' After sitting 'on the fence', Victoria appears to be doing the same - envisioning a future where she has a 'love-hate relationship' with the man who raised her. 'Whether I like it or not, he is my dad. I think if he was guilty, it would be a love-hate relationship. This is my dad and I love him as my dad,' she says. 'The hate is the other side of him that came out.' But Ellerup's seems to be still in a place of denial about the man she has known and loved since the age of 18. Professor Salz says that a wife may align with a suspected serial killer if she 'cannot accept this was their marriage, their partner and they feel overwhelming shame and guilt and so they deny to themselves this could be true.' Even if Ellerup's changes down the line, she shows little sign of wanting to let go of what she thinks of as their fairytale. To the man accused of slaughtering multiple women, she has an unwavering, romantic message: 'I love you, no matter what.'
New York Post
11-06-2025
- New York Post
Kin of accused Gilgo Beach killer Rex Heuermann recall night their lives changed in new documentary: ‘This isn't happening'
The pounding on the door of the unkempt Massapequa Park house late on the night of July 13, 2023, changed the lives of Rex Heuermann's family forever. FBI agents and local cops forced their way in and upended the lives of the accused Long Island serial killer's wife and two grown children, just hours after the hulking architect was arrested outside his Manhattan office in the grisly cold-case murder of three women. Their beloved father is a monster. Advertisement 7 Rex Heuermann's wife, Asa Ellerup, left, and her daughter, Victoria Heuerrmann, recall the 2023 FBI raid. Peacock 7 Rex Heuermann's Massapequa Park home has been mobbed by media and onlookers since his 2023 arrest. James Keivom 'And I just hear banging: 'FBI, open up!'' Victoria Heuermann, the accused killer's daughter, said in her first public interviews in the new Peacock docu-series, 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets.' 'This isn't happening. This isn't happening. Advertisement 'I knew my dad had stuff with the IRS, Dept. of Labor. But the FBI?' she said. 'And they said we have evidence your dad murdered all these women and your home is now a crime scene. I never would imagine I'd hear that in my life.' Rex Heuermann, 61, now stands charged with the murder and mutilation of seven sex workers who disappeared more than 30 years and were dumped in desolate stretches of Long Island. 7 Rex Heuermann is charged with the murder and mutilation of seven Long Island sex workers since 1993. Newsday 7 Rex Heuermann is charged with killing seven sex workers since 1993. He has not been linked to the death of Karen Vergata, who is shown at bottom right. Suffolk County Police Department Advertisement Suffolk County prosecutors maintain that the accused killer kept a detailed 'how-to' document on his computer to plan the gruesome slayings — and may have slaughtered the women in the family basement while his wife and daughters were away. They suggested the murders could have happened inside a concrete gun vault in the family's basement, where Heuermann, a gun enthusiast, stored as many as 300 weapons. To his wife and children, news of his alleged exploits shattered their lives in one night. Asa Ellerup, Rex Heuermann's wife, recalled waiting up for her husband to return from his Midtown office on the day of the FBI raid, when the knock on the door came around 11 p.m. Advertisement 'I was waiting for my husband, but he didn't come home. And then suddenly I see them come on the front porch,' she said. 'They push their way in and they asked me, do you know why we're here. And I said, my husband's guns? 7 Peacock's new docu-series, 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets,' includes first-ever interviews. AP 'And the woman investigator says to me, 'Have you heard about the murders on Gilgo Beach?' And I said, 'I heard of them, but I don't know anything. And she said, 'Your husband, he knows all about it,'' Ellerup recalled. 'They're telling me that my husband is alleged to be some horrific serial killer 'And then the investigator says to me my husband will be charged in the morning with murdering three women,' she said in the documentary. 'And I told her she's crazy.' Ellerup, Victoria and her half-brother Christopher Sheridan were all kicked out of the house and into a nearby hotel with little more than the clothes on their backs — but only after being grilled by the feds. 'They started asking about if my dad was ever sexually advancive towards mem or touched me, and I said no, I cannot really recall any time he was like that,' Victoria Heuermann said. 7 Victoria Heuermann, left, and her mother, Asa Ellerup, said the FBI barged into their home on July 13, 2023. Peacock 'For the first time in my life, I'm not waking up in the morning and going to work. I actually don't even know what tomorrow was even gonna look like.' Advertisement What followed was the first of two intrusive and thorough searches of the house that saw local, state and federal authorities rummage inside and dig out the backyard in a hunt for evidence. Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said DNA evidence from hairs found on the bodies of all seven victims linked back to the Heuermanns — including a sample found on a pizza box outside the Manhattan office and a sample snatched from a soft drink Victoria tossed into a trash can. Heuermann, 61, stands accused of killing seven sex workers since 1993 and dumping them along Ocean Parkway — with the remains found between 2010 and 2011. 7 Rex Heuermann and Asa Ellerup met when they were 18 and eventually married in 1995 in Sweden. Peacock Advertisement The murders remained unsolved until his 2023 arrest in the deaths of Amber Lynn Costello, Megan Waterman and Melissa Barthelemy. In January 2024 he was also charged with killing Maureen Brainard-Barnes, with the four women collectively known as the 'Gilgo Four' among locals. Tierney ultimately charged Heuermann with three other murders — Valerie Mack, Jessica Taylor and Sandra Costilla, the first victim, who was killed in 1993. Heuermann pleaded not guilty to all of the charges lodged against him. His lawyer, Michael Brown, has asked the judge to separate at least some of the murder cases to have them tried separately, and has raised doubts about the DNA evidence.
Daily Mail
10-06-2025
- Daily Mail
Creepy moment Gilgo Beach suspect's wife goes into 'secret' room hidden in the basement for the first time
The wife of accused Gilgo Beach serial killer suspect' is seen for the first time stepping inside a secret room in the basement of her Massapequa Park home- also known as the alleged 'kill room.' The new Peacock docuseries 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets,' takes viewers inside the hidden room located inside the gun vault where Heuermann stored nearly 280 firearms. Video shows Asa Ellerup entering the wood-paneled room where Heuermann's clothes hang and a safe is bolted to the wall with a 'warning' sticker. 'Explosives Inside. Do Not Attempt to Drill or Torch this Site.' 'He didn't want anyone to have access to (the secret room) so nobody would know not because he was hiding anything it was because he wanted to secure a safe in there,' she said. Asa's daughter Victoria Heuermann, 29, says 'that is the secret room everyone talks about. It is kind of a walk-in closet in the gun room that is actually underneath the stairs.' 'I actually didn't see what the inside actually looked like until after this happened. I wouldn't go in there myself,' she added. The 61-year-old married architect was arrested in July 2023 for the murder of three young woman. He was linked to four other murders bringing that number to seven. 'Alot of media are calling the vault the kill room that is where he stored all his guns,' Victoria reveals in the docuseries. 'As a kid he showed them to me and did teach me to use a gun when I was old enough but the vault was always locked,' she recalled. 'The only time I was in there was when he was in there.' In the clip, Ellerup shows where her ex-husband kept his guns along the wall which was now bare. 'The steel door has a combination lock. The lever here is an easy way out so no one can get locked in here,' she explained. David Jiminez, a longtime friend of Heuermann, who went to the gun range with him spoke about the time he went inside the basement and saw the 'the famous gun room.' 'I recalled vividly he (Rex) said in 30 years you are the fourth person to ever be in this room. I was like wow. That is when he showed me his collection,' he said. 'He started collecting rifles and all sorts of gun at 18. It was an amazing collection.' His vast collection of firearms were seized during one of the search warrants. And, the steel door that housed the gun vault that showed his initials 'RAH' - 'Rex Andrew Heuermann' was removed from the property in May. It is unclear what investigators found in the secret room that will not be disclosed until the trial begins. 'He didn't want anyone to have access to (the secret room) so nobody would know -not because he was hiding anything it was because he wanted to secure a safe in there,' she said Rex pictured with friends at the gun range Victoria talked about how much she admired her father growing up, and showed a wooden dollhouse he had built for her when she was a child. Several photos of a young Victoria are seen with her father during the episode. At one point, she speaks about her parents divorce that was finalized in April. 'They did this divorce to protect the assets. It is now legally her house. If we lost the house we would be homeless. It's our house but it doesn't mean we are not a family anymore,' she said. In the docuseries, Ellerup also talks about her first marriage and her son Christopher, she had before her marriage ended and before she met Heuermann. At the time, she was working at 7-Eleven, she said, and Heuermann was in college. 'I love tall, dark and handsome,' she confessed. 'I was madly in love with him.' Heuermann has lived in the home in Massapequa Park his whole life, with Ellerup moving in when the couple wed in 1995. Looking through old photo albums, she shows a much thinner and younger Heurmann. A smiling wedding photo. Pictures from their early years and when he was a young father. However, the recurring theme that comes up during the three- part docuseries is how his wife of 27 years could not have known. 'Rex was not seeing prostitutes. He was a family man,' Ellerup insists. 'He didn't do it.' 'I would need to hear if from Rex, face to face, that he killed these girls for me to believe it,' she said Ellerup along with her attorney Robert Macedonio have attended all of Heuermann's court hearings with Victoria attending, at times. In one clip, Asa is applying some makeup before she leaves her home and heads out to the courthouse. 'My husband never kept me out of anything that is why I am going to the courthouse that is why. I want to see it for myself. It is important for me to know what he is going through and I want to be a part of it.' One of the clips shows a smiling Asa in her attorney's office telling him that she 'really liked seeing him (Rex). It was comforting,' she said. 'I just don't see him that way. No. That is not the Rex I know,' she said in part. Rex Heuermann appears in Suffolk County criminal court Melissa Barthelemy (top left), Amber Costello (top right), Megan Waterman (bottom left), and Maureen Brainard-Barnes (bottom right) became known as the 'Gilgo Four' Valerie Mack (left) disappeared in 2000 and parts of her body were discovered in Long Island that November. Jessica Taylor (right) vanished in 2003 with some of her remains being found in Manorville that year Sandra Costilla (left) was murdered in 1993, making her the earliest known victim. Karen Vergata's (right) remains were identified in 2023. Heuermann has not been charged in connection to her death He is now charged with the murders of seven women over a two-decade reign of horror running from 1993 to 2011. All the victims were working as sex workers when they vanished. Their bodies were then found dumped along Ocean Parkway near Gilgo Beach as well as other remote spots on Long Island. Since Heuermann's arrest, prosecutors have unveiled a trove of evidence against him, including hairs belonging to him and his family members found on some of the victims, cellphone data placing him in contact with some victims, and a chilling 'planning document' where he allegedly intricately detailed his kills. He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges. Fears that a serial killer or killers were at large on Long Island began back in May 2010, when sex worker Shannan Gilbert, 24, vanished in bizarre circumstances one night. During a search for Gilbert in December 2010, officers came across the body of Melissa Barthelemy in the marshes by Gilgo Beach. Within days, three more women's bodies - Amber Costello, Maureen Brainard-Barnes and Megan Waterman - had been found. The four victims, who became known as the Gilgo Four, had been dumped within a quarter mile of each other, some of them bound and wrapped in burlap. Over the following months, the remains of seven other victims were found.
The Independent
10-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
Daughter of accused Gilgo Beach killer believes her father ‘most likely' did it, new film says
The daughter of accused Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann believes he 'most likely' committed the infamous killings in New York even as her mother steadfastly defends her ex-husband's innocence in a new documentary released Tuesday. The admission from Victoria Heuermann isn't made on camera but through a statement from producers near the end of 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets,' a three-part documentary on NBC's streaming service Peacock. 'A week before the series release, Victoria Heuermann told the producers that based on publicly available facts that have been presented and explained to her, she now believes her father is most likely the Gilgo Beach killer,' reads a statement at the close of the final episode of the documentary, which was produced by musician 50 Cent's production company, G-Unit Film and Television. Bob Macedonio, an attorney for Heuermann's now ex-wife, Asa Ellerup, said in a statement after the documentary's release that 'time will only tell' whether his client will ever accept that her husband may have been a serial killer. Heuermann's lawyer didn't immediately respond to an email seeking comment. The Manhattan architect has been charged with killing seven women, most of them sex workers, and dumping their bodies on a desolate parkway not far from Gilgo Beach on Long Island, some 50 miles (80 kilometers) from Manhattan. He has pleaded not guilty and is due back in Riverhead court June 17 as a judge continues to weigh whether to allow key DNA evidence into the trial. In the documentary, Victoria Heuermann struggles to reconcile her childhood memories with the portrait of the killer described by authorities. She says her father was around the family '90% of the time' and was never violent toward any of them. At the same time, Victoria Heuermann acknowledged there were times when he stayed home while the family went on vacation and that she was around 10 to 13 years old when the killings happened. Prosecutors say Heuerman committed some of the killings in the basement while his family was out of town. 'Whether or not I believe my dad did it or not, I'm on the fence about that,' said the now 28-year-old. 'Part of me thinks he didn't do it, but at the same time, I don't know, he could have just totally had a double life.' Ellerup, for her part, maintained she saw no 'abnormal behavior' in their nearly three decades of marriage. She dismissed a computer file prosecutors claim is a 'blueprint' of his crimes as 'absurd.' The document features a series of checklists for before, during and after a killing, such as a 'body prep' checklist that includes among other items a note to 'remove head and hands.' Ellerup also shrugged off other evidence prosecutors have enumerated in court documents, including a vast collection of bondage and torture pornography found on electronic devices seized from their home, and hairs linked to Heuermann that were recovered on most of the victims' bodies. At the same time, she revealed that in July 2009, around the time one of his alleged victims went missing, Heuermann suddenly renovated a bathroom while she and their two children were on vacation for weeks to visit her family in Iceland. But she noted her former husband eventually joined the family for their final week of their trip. 'My husband, he's a family man. He's my hero,' Ellerup said. 'What I want to say to him is, 'I love you, no matter what.'' Ellerup divorced Heuermann after his arrest in 2023. But in the documentary, Victoria Heuermann says the separation was for financial reasons to protect the family's assets. Indeed, the mother and daughter have been regularly attending court hearings with their attorney. The filmmakers even captured them speaking to Heuermann by phone from jail. A Peacock spokesperson said Ellerup was paid a location fee and a licensing fee for use of family archive materials, although the payments cannot go toward the defendant or his defense funds. The family, which also includes Ellerup's adult son from a prior marriage, is planning to put up its notoriously ramshackle house in well-to-do Massapequa Park for sale as they look to move to a property they own in South Carolina. ___ Follow Philip Marcelo on X: @philmarcelo.
