THE COURTROOM FELL SILENT: EVERY EMOTIONAL MOMENT FROM THE GILGO BEACH K-I-LLER’S SENTENCING, INCLUDING HIS SH0CKING FIRST WORDS
It was perhaps the truest words he could have spoken.
‘The words I would say have no meaning.’
When Rex Heuermann finally broke his silence – in his squeaky, bumbling voice – for the first time since his arrest for the murders of eight women across a 17-year killing spree, he had virtually nothing to say.
While it was the most he has ever spoken in the three years since his arrest, there was no apology, no attempt at an explanation for his heinous crimes and no flicker of remorse for the lives he had stolen to feed his own sadistic desires – only a brief acceptance for the first time that ‘I am responsible for what was said in this room today.’
Yet, as we sat just feet away from the Gilgo Beach serial killer inside a Suffolk County courtroom full to the brim with victims’ families, law enforcement, and journalists, it was clear that no one there cared to hear what he had to say anyway.
The 62-year-old had spent most of his adult life trying to take away the voices of young, vulnerable women whom he lured, strangled, mutilated, and discarded like trash. Now, finally, it was his victims’ turn to get their voices back.
During a gut-wrenching, hours-long hearing, daughters, sisters, fathers, and mothers stood, tears streaming down their faces, voices choking with raw emotion, and shared their loving memories of Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Megan Waterman, 22, Amber Costello, 27, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25, Jessica Taylor, 20, Sandra Costilla, 28, Valerie Mack, 24 and Karen Vergata, 34.
Heuermann tortured and killed their loved ones between 1993 and 2010, abandoning their remains in lonely spots around Long Island before returning home to play the family man with his then-wife, Asa Ellerup, and two children, Victoria and Christopher.
Now, it was his turn to sit all alone, his family members nowhere to be seen.
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Gilgo Beach Serial Killer Rex Heuermann appears in court on Wednesday for sentencing
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The victims clockwise from top left: Sandra Costilla, Karen Vergata, Melissa Barthelemy, Valerie Mack, Megan Waterman, Amber Costello, Maureen Brainard-Barnes and Jessica Taylor
The predator had targeted small, vulnerable women by design, writing in his own planning document that ‘small is good.’
As the impact statements were read, the hulking 6ft 4, 240lbs killer’s frame appeared to shrink into the chair, staring dead ahead, too cowardly to turn and face the families behind him
Heuermann, who had once called a 15-year-old girl to gloat about raping and murdering her sister, now sat quiet and too afraid to look that same woman – 32 years old today – in the eye.
The depraved killer who had meticulously planned his kills and struck fear into the Long Island community for years had finally been reduced to what Judge Timothy Mazzei described as ‘a disgusting and despicable small man.’
Mazzei did not try to hide his disdain – at one point cutting Heuermann off mid-statement to bark ‘stand up!’ at the killer as he addressed the court.
When Mazzei shouted ‘Get him out of here’ and Heuermann was led out of the courtroom in shackles, the courtroom erupted with the voices of the families.
They leaped to their feet and cheered, some chanting ‘Ogre! Ogre!’, as others cried: ‘Justice!’
‘I hope they r**e you in the a** and kill you,’ one woman shouted.
It was a stunning comment that served as a harrowing reminder of Heuermann’s own sick actions as the tables were finally turned against him.
In a powerful moment earlier inside the courtroom, Melissa Barthelemy’s sister Amanda Fundenburg had recalled how Heuermann called her from her sister’s cell phone when she went missing, taunting her that he had murdered his sister and using those exact words to torment the terrified teen.
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Amanda Funderburg, the sister of victim Melissa Barthelemy, was just 15 when her sister was murdered. ‘Look at me when I talk to you. I waited 17 years,’ she told him defiantly, turning to face him directly
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Melissa Cann, sister of Maureen Brainard- Barnes, was overwhelmed by emotion as she gave her victim impact statement
‘You said you r**ed her in the a** and that I should have seen the look on her face when you r**ed her in the a**. And that you let her body rot,’ she said.
Amanda was just 15. Every time she got a phone call from that point, she feared it was the killer calling again.
Today, she stood before him as a young woman no longer afraid, instead warning him that ‘the things I would do to you are far worse than what you did.’
‘Look at me when I talk to you. I waited 17 years,’ she told him defiantly, turning to face him directly.
For a split second, Heuermann glanced up and appeared to meet her eyes before quickly staring back down at the table in front of him.
In a powerful and brave moment, Amanda told the killer directly: ‘I know everyone spoke about heaven, but save me a spot in hell because I’ll see you there.’
Silence filled the air as she returned to her seat, hugging her relatives. She then appeared to pump her fist in defiance.
All around the room, we could feel the raw anger and emotion spilling out.
After all, these were families who had waited in some cases more than three decades to face their loved ones’ killer and get justice.
It is almost 33 years since Heuermann stole the life of his first victim, Sandra Costilla.
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Jasmine Robinson, cousin of Jessica Taylor, looked at Heuermann with repulsion as she spoke
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The judge told Heuermann he was a ‘disgusting’ man and a ‘coward’ as he was sentenced to life in prison
It is also around 16 years since his human graveyard was discovered and Long Island came to the awful realization that a serial killer walked among the community.
In those decades, young children became young men and women, growing up without the guidance of their mothers and now older than they were when they died.
Sisters, parents and friends have grown older. Some passed away before this day could come.
As reporters who have worked on this case for years – since a time when the case seemed to have long grown cold and an arrest seemed a far-flung possibility – it’s a day we also believed might never come.
Breaking down in tears, Melissa Cann, Maureen Brainard-Barnes’s sister, told the court about the agony she had endured waiting so long for answers.
On the night of July 9, 2007, Heuermann picked up Brainard-Barnes and strangled her to death.
‘For years, we lived in the shadow of what you did. We carried the fear, the unanswered questions,’ her sister said, pausing several times as she struggled to contain her emotion.
‘You are no longer in control of this story… This is about more than justice. It’s about reclaiming what you tried to break and honoring what you can never destroy: Love.’
All eight female victims had family members inside the courtroom to support them.
The message was clear: these young women were mothers, daughters, sisters, friends who were loved by so many. And their jobs working in sex work did not define them.
It was a message that spilled outside of the courtroom, too.
In a powerful show of support, a group of women working as sex workers in New York City – like some of the victims lured by Heuermann, held banners aloft sharing the victims’ names.
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Elizabeth Meserve, the aunt of Megan Waterman and Liliana Waterman, the daughter of Megan Waterman, supports one another in the courtroom as they speak of their profound loss
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Valerie Mack’s adoptive father Ed Mack unleashes his emotions on his daughter’s killer as his family watches from the sidelines
One of the women, Delilah, told the Daily Mail that they were there to ‘show support for our sisters who were murdered and for their families, and to say that you can’t keep hurting sex workers and get away with it anymore because we are a strong united community, and we look out for each other, and we stand up when things like this happen.’
‘This is the day we’ve pretty much been waiting for – his sentencing. This doesn’t feel like justice, but it does feel like a small relief that one of the thousands of men who hurt women and who hurt sex workers is finally not going to be able to do that anymore.’
By contrast, Heuermann had no one there to support him.
His ex-wife, Asa Ellerup, had been a regular fixture at his court hearings and has continued to support him and visit him in prison despite knowing he murdered eight women inside their family home. But last week she announced she was not attending the sentencing out of respect for the victims.
In her absence, Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney told the court that Heuermann was not capable of even caring about his own family – and that he had continued to manipulate them since his arrest.
The victims’ families also condemned Heuermann’s own family for profiting off their pain after they secured a rumored $1 million deal for a docuseries with Peacock.
Megan Waterman’s aunt, Elizabeth Meserve, appealed to the New York state legislature to close the loopholes in the current Son of Sam laws – preventing criminals from profiting from their crimes – to include criminals’ family members.
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Violet Sager and Jasmine Robinson, spoke of the special bond they shared with their cousin Jessica Taylor and how they miss her everyday
‘This is the kind of world we live in – a demon tortured our loved ones and his family gets filthy rich from his crimes,’ she said, while Megan’s daughter Liliana Waterman held a protective hand on her shoulder.
At just 19, the softly spoken teen bravely took the podium herself, welling up with tears as she recalled being just three when her mom went missing.
Countless questions had whirled round in her head since then: ‘Was she in pain? Was she scared? Was she thinking of me? What were her last words? I knew she was trying to build a better world for me. Was this somehow my fault?’
When it was her turn to speak, Jasmine Robinson, the cousin of Jessica Taylor, stared down the man who murdered her cousin, calling him a ‘freak’ and a ‘clown’ and told of the moment that she got the call that she had been found dismembered.
Each word felt like a gut punch in the courtroom as she emphasised ‘torso’, ‘skull’ and ‘all of her’ – hammering home how Heuermann had butchered the young woman’s body in a bid to try to evade capture.
‘I could never wrap my head around the word torso. Torso – headless and handless. These words haunt me…Torso is a chopped up body,’ she emphasized, raising her voice more and more.
‘They found her skull. Her skull – my cousin’s skull – found years later, miles away,’ she said.
Heuermann’s dismemberment of some of the victims was one of his many meticulous methods and plans to try to evade capture.
But in a powerful moment, Jessica’s cousin Violet Swager reminded him that he had failed miserably.
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The victim impact statements were so heartbreaking Judge Mazzei got choked up
Pointing to Heuermann’s ‘planning document’ – a sick blueprint for his murders, including prep and disposal sections – she turned his preparations and meticulous planning against him.
‘You certainly were sloppy. You made a whole planning document to kill my cousin, and you didn’t do that right,’ she said.
‘Supplies, hair net – well, so much for that,’ she said, referring to the hairs belonging to Heuermann and his family members that were found on the victims’ bodies and ultimately provided crucial DNA evidence.
‘Remove identifying marks – well we know you didn’t do that because she was identified by the tattoo you couldn’t remove,’ she said.
Excoriating Heuermann – whose interest in serial killers has been documented in both his reading material found inside his home and while behind bars – she questioned why the FBI’s BAU would want to study him.
‘You’re boring, you’re not prolific, you’re not even top five,’ she said.
If any of the cutting and heartbreaking words of his victims’ families caused him to feel anything, Heuermann certainly didn’t show it. His lack of meaningful comments was matched by his stony expression throughout the sentencing.
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A search of Heuermann’s home in Massapequa Park, Long Island, in July 2023, just days after his arrest
When asked by Judge Mazzei if he is even ‘a little bit sorry for what you’ve done to these poor, innocent women’, Heuermann claimed nonchalantly, ‘yes.’
‘No you are not, you piece of s**t,’ one of the family members shouted.
It’s something he will have the rest of his life to ponder as he will soon learn which state prison he will serve out his seven consecutive life sentences.
While the years ahead look far from appealing for him, the families of the victims who have waited decades for justice, there was a note of future hope.
As Liliana Waterman said: ‘For so many years, this case has been a weight I carried every single day.
‘Today’s proceedings do not erase what happened, and nothing ever will. But today brings accountability.’
SOURCE: https://www.dailymail.com/crime-desk/article-15908837/gilgo-beach-killer-rex-heuermann-sentencing-inside-court.html
