An American suspect in the Long Island serial killer has been arrested after more than a decade of standoff

A society in shock. After more than ten years of investigating a series of finds of corpses of prostitutes Close to Long Island beachesA suspect has been arrested and charged in the murders of three of them, east of New York, authorities said Friday.

In court Friday, the suspect, 59-year-old New York architect Rex Heuerman, was charged and pleaded not guilty to the murders of Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello in 2009 and 2010, while he was indicted. The fourth, according to court documents from the Suffolk County Prosecutor’s Office, was the homicide of Maureen Brainard-Barnes.

Those who were strangled

According to US media, the father was arrested Thursday evening near his office in Manhattan, while his home in Massapequa Park Village, near the beaches where the victims were found, was searched.

The victims, who were found less than 500 meters from Kilgo Beach, were sex workers aged 22 and 27. They were all strangled and “in the same position, the same way, or tied with belts or duct tape, and three were wrapped in burlap-like material,” he explained during an interview.

The case began in May 2010 with a report of the disappearance of Shannon Gilbert, a 24-year-old prostitute from neighboring New Jersey.

11 bodies were found

In total, the remains of eleven human bodies, nine women, one man and one woman, were found between 2010 and 2011 on the beaches of Kilgo Beach, Oak Beach, in thickets between the sand and the road. . The findings terrified the locals and led police to investigate for years, which to this day, has led to the possibility that one or more killers may have been on the rampage in the area.

According to court documents, the investigation focused on the architect after it was discovered that the victim’s vehicle was registered in his name when he disappeared in 2022. From there, investigators found DNA and phone evidence against the suspect.

According to the prosecutor, “Why Hasn’t the Long Island Serial Killer Been Arrested?” With questions like, Rex Hearman conducted hundreds of Internet searches in the investigation. “. Indecent torture images were also found on his computer, the lawyer said.

The series was adapted into the 2020 documentary film Different Facts lost womenStreaming on Netflix.

20 minutes with AFP