Tuesday, December 17, 2024
Year : 2, Issue: 16
ABC7 News: 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 her family that year in New Jersey.
The defense was given until next month to file motions related to evidence. The defense has questioned the DNA methods prosecutors used and may try to limit admissibility at trial.
Prosecutors said they linked Heuermann to Mack’s death in part through a mitochondrial DNA analysis of a female hair found on Mack’s body. It matched the profiles of Heuermann’s wife and daughter, the bail application said. At the time of Mack’s murder, Heuermann’s daughter would have been between 3 and 4 years old.
Prosecutors said they also linked Heuermann to Mack’s death through evidence recovered on some of the 350 electronic devices they seized from him that include his “significant collection of violent, bondage and torture pornography” dating back to at least 1994.
This online collection included images of breast mutilation and tying up women with rope, two things prosecutors said are consistent with injuries inflicted on Mack’s breast and how she was bound.
The document also included a “body prep” section with a note to “remove head and hands,” according to the bail application. That relates to the condition of Mack’s remains, prosecutors said.
“The lives of these women matter. We, as investigators, understand that. No one understands that more than the families,” Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said at a news conference with Mack’s parents and other victims’ relatives.
Heuermann is charged with killing six other women whose remains were found on Long Island.
The investigation into the Gilgo Beach killings dates back to 2010, when police searching for a missing woman found 10 sets of human remains in the scrub along a barrier island parkway, prompting fears of a serial killer.
