Eyewitness to Gilgo Beach

Rex Heuermann admitted Wednesday to murdering eight women during a 17-year killing spree that terrorized Long Island and labeled him the Gilgo Beach serial killer. Several of the victims' relatives sobbed quietly and were seen wiping tears as Heuermann admitted to the rash of killings beginning in 1993 and concluding in 2010. The killings went unsolved for two decades until the Suffolk County dist...

Accused Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann has been charged in the death of a seventh woman. Heuermann is charged with one count of second-degree murder in connection with the murder of Valerie Mack, according to a superseding indictment unsealed Tuesday. Mack, whose remains were first found on Long Island in 2000. Mack, 24, had been working as an escort in Philadelphia and was last seen by h...

Even though there has been an arrest in the Gilgo Beach serial killings, investigators are still trying to solve cold-case murders and authorities are asking for the public's help. On Monday, Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney released three new updated sketches of a Gilgo Beach victim. The Asian male victim's remains were recovered along Ocean Parkway in April 2011. However, authorities...

Suffolk County prosecutors have received some 7,000 tips following the arrest of alleged Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann, district attorney Ray Tierney said after his latest court appearance. Prosecutors turned over "voluminous" evidence to Heuermann's defense, including results from DNA lab work, data from Heuermann's electronic devices, and notes from searches of his home. Heuermann has...

Rex Heuermann, the accused Gilgo Beach serial killer charged in six killings is now being eyed by investigators for even more, nearly one year to the day that the Manhattan architect, husband, and father of two was arrested. Heuermann's adult children - and his now-estranged wife, Asa Ellerup, showed support at court. Robert Macedonio, Asa's attorney, talked with Eyewitness News reporter, Chantee...

Disturbing new details have emerged in the Gilgo Beach serial killings as Rex Heuermann, 60, was charged in two additional women. The new charges also significantly expand the timeline in the Gilgo Beach case, with the first murder Heuermann is accused of committing now taking place in 1993. Prosecutors also revealed disturbing "planning" documents that they allege the suspect used in his killings...

Suspected Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann is expected to be charged this week with an additional murder, according to Newsday. Heuermann has pleaded not guilty to killing four women -- Megan Waterman, Melissa Barthelemy, Amber Costello, and Maureen Brainard-Barnes - whose remains were found near Gilgo Beach along Ocean Parkway. Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney declined to comme...

The former executive assistant of accused Long Island serial killer Rex Heuermann is speaking for the first time exclusively with Eyewitness News. Donna Sturman told investigative reporter Kristin Thorne she still has not gotten over the shock of the claims made against her former boss. "It's traumatizing," she said. "It's so unbelievable." Sturman worked for Heuermann from 2017 to 2018 at his arc...

"Rex Heuermann is everything we've been led to believe would be the guy," said reporter Josh Einiger. "He's kind of a loner. He's kind of antisocial. His house is different from every other house on that block. It's sort of a mess. He works in the city. He has a job, where he's very technical, where he's an architect and engineer." The amazing details of the investigation that finally collared a s...

On July 13, 2023, police finally made an arrest in the Gilgo Beach murder case. "This was an earthquake in Massapequa Park. This was a storm like they had never expected this," recalled Eyewitness News reporter Stacey Sager. Rex Heuermann was arrested in Midtown Manhattan. He was initially charged in the deaths of Megan Waterman, Amber Lynn Costello, and Melissa Barthelemy. Investigators also name...

Eyewitness News got an alert that Suffolk County police were going to release surveillance video of Megan Waterman leaving a hotel in Hauppauge -- the last place she was seen. "As reporters were thinking, again, why do this now?" recalled Kristin Thorne. "They've had this video for so many years -- why now? And they said they want to keep the case going." Then on May 9, 2022, Suffolk County Police...

In December 2015, the FBI joined the investigation. Why did that collaboration not happen for so many years? "It didn't happen because of politics. We had a police chief in Suffolk County, as well as a DA, that did not seem open to FBI involvement," recalled Kristin Thorne. On Jan. 16, 2020, police released photos of a belt imprinted with the letters "H-M" or "M-H" to the public. Police say they b...

After a year and a half of searching, investigators found the skeletal remains of Shannan Gilbert on Gilgo Beach. "What was the ultimate stunner in all of this is that they believed -- and still do believe -- that Shannan Gilbert was not murdered. That Shannan Gilbert died in an accidental drowning," recalled reporter Josh Einiger. A few years later, Shannan Gilbert's mother, Mari Gilbert, who is...

Investigators had found 10 bodies and identified five of them, but they were still searching for Shannan Gilbert. "This investigation started because Shannan Gilbert disappeared," said reporter Kristin Thorne. "It wasn't until Shannan Gilbert disappeared that her family started to hold police accountable and say -- you have to get out there and try to find Shannan Gilbert." Investigators found a c...

Investigators continued to find more bodies, but the remains differed from those of the "Gilgo Four". Police found three more victims in the area between Oak Beach and Gilgo Beach, bringing the total count of victims to eight. Investigators identified the victims as Jane Doe Number 6, a baby girl and an Asian man. Investigators then say they believe they are looking for three, if not four, killers...

It began on a regular garden variety day in December, when Eyewitness News reporter Josh Einiger and his photographer, Tony Saturno, were covering stories in Suffolk County. "We were on our way back and we got a call from the desk - saying 'there's a crime scene, there's a maybe body discovered', way down south on Ocean Parkway. Go check it out," Einiger said. When they arrived at the scene, it wa...

Shannan Gilbert's disappearance in 2010 sparked the discovery of 11 bodies on and near Gilgo Beach on Long Island. "One of the most significant things I've ever heard at any kind of public official say, I think it was the first full day after that first report that we did," recalled Einiger. "There was a press conference with the man who was then the police commissioner. And he said something that...

The news coverage of the Gilgo Beach murders began with a single live shot: a live remote, plagued with technical difficulties, from a barren and frozen beach off Long Island's South Shore. Little did anyone know how important that report would be. No one could have predicted the international spectacle that would follow. That first report was on an impossibly cold December night in 2011. They had...