A Long Island architect has been charged with murder in the deaths of three of the 11 victims in a long-unsolved string of killings known as the Gilgo Beach murders after detectives pursuing a new lead matched DNA from a pizza he ate to genetic material found on the women's remains.
Rex Heuermann, who has lived for decades across a bay from where the remains were found, is charged with killing Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello. He is also considered the prime suspect in the death of another woman whose body was also found bound and hidden in thick underbrush along a remote beach highway, authorities said.
Determining who killed them, and why, has vexed a slew of seasoned homicide detectives through several changes in police leadership. Last year, an interagency task force was formed with investigators from the FBI, as well as state and local police departments, aimed at solving the case. Tierney said authorities moved to charge Heuermann now with three of the killings "out of concern for this defendant fleeing and the danger to the community." They are continuing to work toward charging him in the death of a fourth Gilgo victim, Maureen Brainard-Barnes.
The arrest came as a shock and a relief to some of the relatives after so many years of waiting for a break in the case.Law enforcement personnel converged Friday morning on Heuermann's home, a small red house about 40 miles east of midtown Manhattan. Dozens of residents mingled alongside police and media, watching as a half-dozen investigators, some in protective suits, conferred outside the front porch, which was in disrepair, its roof propped up by 2-by-4s.
"We're happy to see that they're finally active, the police, in accomplishing something. Let's wait and see what it all leads to," said John Ray, the attorney for the families of two other women whose remains were found, Shannan Gilbert and Jessica Taylor.
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