For more than a decade, the Gilgo Beach serial killings baffled investigators. The break came from an unlikely source — a discarded pizza crust.
In January 2023, architect and “family man” Rex Heuermann threw away a pizza box on Fifth Avenue outside his Manhattan office. Months later, DNA from the leftover crust linked him to a 2010 murder and, later, a string of unsolved killings in a chilling case that has haunted New York’s Long Island for years.
Prosecutors said Heuermann was responsible for the deaths of seven women: Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25, Amber Lynn Costello, 27, Megan Waterman, 22, Sandra Costilla, 28, Jessica Taylor, 20, and Valerie Mack, 24. He initially denied them all.
Heuermann returned to court April 8, 2026, where he switched his plea from not guilty to guilty. He also admitted to an eighth homicide – the 1996 killing of Karen Vergata, a Manhattan mother of two whose remains were found west of Gilgo Beach and on Fire Island, more than a decade apart.
He is likely to get life in prison with no possibility for parole when he is sentenced on June. 17. As part of his guilty plea, Heuermann has agreed to cooperate with the FBI’s behavioral analysis unit to help catch other serial killers.
The investigation into the crimes spanned decades, beginning with a 1993 killing and stretching through the 2010 disappearance of another woman that would ultimately expose a burial ground along a desolate stretch of Ocean Parkway. But an arrest wouldn’t come for 13 more years.
Rex Heuermann, a longtime Long Island resident, is a married father of two who lived in Massapequa Park. He commuted into Manhattan for his job as an architect at a company he founded, RH Consultants & Associates.
He was arrested on July 13, 2023, near his Midtown office, where authorities said key evidence, including cellphone data and burner phone activity, placed him in contact with several victims.
Heuermann lived about 20 minutes from Gilgo Beach, with his wife, Asa Ellerup, and their adult children. Neighbors described him as a quiet, largely unremarkable family man, though others recalled unsettling encounters.
In his professional life, some acquaintances described him as arrogant or intense. Paul Teitelbaum, who worked with him, said Heuermann had a “swagger” and an attitude that said: “I’m the expert, you’re lucky to have me.”
Interior designer Dominique Vidal recalled repeated, unwanted calls and a “creepy” voicemail despite no working relationship.
Heuermann has lived on Long Island most of his life and attended Berner High School in Massapequa Park, where classmates described him as shy and socially awkward.
The case that would eventually capture Heuermann began in May 2010 with the disappearance of 23-year-old Shannan Gilbert.
During a 21-minute 911 call, she pleaded for help: “There’s somebody after me…somebody’s after me, please.” She fled a client’s home in the early morning hours and vanished.
During a search for Gilbert in a dense thicket close to the beach, police discovered human remains. Within days, four victims had been found. By spring 2011, the number of victims rose to 10.
They first four victims became known as the “Gilgo Four” – Melissa Barthelemy, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, Amber Lynn Costello and Megan Waterman. All four of the women were in their 20s and worked as escorts.
Over the next year, investigators uncovered more remains – eventually totaling at least 10 victims, including women, a man and a toddler.
Gilbert’s body was found in December 2011. But she has not been linked to Heuermann and authorities long maintained her death was accidental. Her family strongly disputed that conclusion.
Prosecutors charged Heuermann with the deaths of seven women. Maureen Brainard-Barnes was 25 when she vanished in 2007. Her remains were found at Gilgo Beach in December 2010, police said. DNA belonging to Heuermann’s wife was found in hair recovered from a belt used to restrain Brainard-Barnes, according to an indictment. Ellerup was not considered a suspect as she was out of state when Brainard-Barnes was killed.
Melissa Barthelemy, 24, went missing in July 2009. That same year, Barthelemy’s sister, Amanda Funderburg, said she had received several taunting phone calls that were believed to be from the killer, according to authorities. Her remains were found in December 2010 along Ocean Parkway near the others.
Megan Waterman, 22, was last seen at a hotel in Hauppauge before her remains were found along Gilgo Beach in December 2010.
Amber Lynn Costello, 27, disappeared in September 2010 after leaving her home to meet a client. A witness described that client as “ogre-like” and driving a Chevrolet Avalanche, according to prosecutors. Her remains were found in December 2010.
Court records show that Heuermann was linked to the “Gilgo Four” murders through a tip about his pickup truck, a stash of burner phones, “sadistic” online searches and phone calls taunting victims’ families. Email accounts believed to have been used by Heuermann were used “to access and/or conduct searches related to pornography, rape, torture, and sex workers several thousand times,” prosecutors said.
His DNA was also found on one of the victims, while his wife’s hair was found on three of the four women he is connected to, according to prosecutors.
In June 2024, Heuermann was charged with two additional murders. Sandra Costilla and Jessica Taylor were the first victims of Heuermann who were murdered before 2007.
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