New York police said the suspected Long Island Serial Killer is housed in the same jail as potential key witnesses in the case against him.
Suffolk County Sheriff Errol Toulon told CBS that they interviewed 141 sex workers and 12 of them claimed to have had previous contact with suspect Rex Heuermann. Heuermann remains jailed without bail at Suffolk County jail — and Toulon revealed that they are expanding their interviews to Nassau County jail and throughout New York City.
“We still haven’t been able to validate those claims of those two women that said that he was violent and aggressive,” he also told CBS.
Earlier this week, John Ray, a lawyer representing the Long Island Serial Killer’s alleged victims, said new evidence links Heuermann to Shannan Gilbert and Karen Vergata.
Gilbert, 24, vanished from Oak Beach, New York, in May 2010 — a year-and-a-half before her remains were discovered in a nearby marsh in late 2011; Vergata, 34, was found dismembered on Fire Island in 1996, and her skull was discovered at Ocean Parkway in 2011.
Though police believed Gilbert’s death was accidental, her disappearance led to the discovery of 10 sets of human remains. Four sets of remains were found at Gilgo Beach in December 2010, and six more (including Vergata’s) were recovered along Ocean Parkway the following spring.
In July, police arrested Heuermann in Manhattan for the 2009 and 2010 murders of three women at Gilgo Beach on Long Island. Heuermann is charged with the murders of Melissa Barthelemy, 24; Megan Waterman, 22; and Amber Lynn Costello, 27. He is the prime suspect in the death of 25-year-old Maureen Brainard-Barnes.
The four women were reportedly wrapped in burlap and buried next to each other on Gilgo Beach.
Heuermann’s attorney has not commented on the latest allegations.
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[Featured image: Rex Heuermann/Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office via AP]
