Global Courant
Editor’s Note: This story contains graphic details.
Before Rex Heuermann’s arrest, years of unanswered questions about the murders of at least 10 sex workers spawned the phantom characters of “LISK” and the “Manorville Butcher.”
Four of the victims – known as the “Gilgo Beach 4” – are connected to Heuermann, who is believed to be “LISK”, short for Long Island Serial Killer. He was charged with three of the murders and is the prime suspect in a fourth.
But there are at least six more victims — including some who were dismembered — found in the same neighborhood along Long Island’s south coast in April 2011, bringing a hotly debated question back to the fore.
“This is hard to talk about, but is this the same killer or are there two?” said Josh Zeman, a filmmaker and producer who got his teeth into this case for a 2017 documentary called “The Killing Season.” “It’s been really mind-boggling for some of the brightest minds in the country.”
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Rex Heuermann will be led to the Arthur M. Cromarty Criminal Complex in Riverhead on Friday, July 14, 2023 for his arraignment. (Matt Agudo/Splash News for Fox News Digital)
Complicating the infamous New York cold case is where and when the body parts of the dismembered victims were found.
The skull of one victim — known only as “Fire Island Jane Doe” — was found on Gilgo Beach in 2011, but her legs were found about 15 miles east of Fire Island in 1996.
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Valerie Mack’s head, hands and right foot were found in 2011 on Gilgo Beach, but her torso was found 11 years earlier in Manorville, New York, about 40 miles east of Gilgo Beach.
Similarly, Jessica Taylor’s skull, hands and one of her forearms were found around the beach along Ocean Parkway in March 2011, but her torso was found in Manorville in 2003.
Maureen Brainard-Barnes, Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello were known as the “Gilgo 4.” The finding of their bodies led to other gruesome discovery victims in the area.
The locations where eight of the 10 bodies were found near Gilgo Beach since December 2010 can be seen in this image from the Suffolk County Police Department. (Reuters/Courtesy of the Suffolk County Police Department)
Law enforcement also found body parts of a young black or biracial Jane Doe, known as “Peaces” after a distinctive tattoo on her left chest, near Gilgo Beach in 2011. But her torso was found in Hempstead Lake State Park in 1997.
A toddler that investigators said was a child of “Peaches” was also found on Gilgo Beach in 2011.
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“So you have a killer who left torsos in Manorville, extra body parts in Gilgo Beach, and the same person theoretically left other body parts in other parts of Long Island,” Zeman said in an interview with Fox News Digital.
“It’s horribly confusing… The fact that these body parts, these torsos, were found in Manorville is why people call this killer ‘The Manorville Butcher’.”
WATCH THE FULL INTERVIEW WITH JOSH ZEMAN
Enter John Bittrolff, a Manorville resident and carpenter by trade who was arrested via DNA in July 2014 for murdering two sex workers named Rita Tangredi and Colleen McNamee.
Theories concocted by the public and law enforcement immediately linked Bittrolff to the Gilgo Beach case, but he beat his victims to death and left them on the side of the road, a third other MO.
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“Many said he must be the Gilgo Beach Killer. He must be the Manorville Butcher. He must be responsible for all these bodies along Ocean Parkway,” Zeman said. “But at the moment we don’t know.
“It was originally said at his trial that an (assistant district attorney) said he may have been connected to more agencies, but we’re yet to find out if that’s actually true or speculation.”
Police remove items, including stuffed animals, from Rex Heuermann’s home in Massapequa Park, NY, Thursday, July 20, 2023 (Mega for Fox News Digital)
New York State Police remove items, including a wooden object, from Rex Heuermann’s home in Massapequa Park, NY, Saturday, July 22, 2023. Heuermann is charged with three counts of murder in connection with the bodies discovered in Gilgo Beach, Long Island. (Mega for Fox News Digital)
Bittrolff was found guilty in 2017 and sentenced to 50 years to life in prison.
“He remains a bit of a tangential and mysterious figure in this whole question of whether there’s one or more killers,” Zeman said.
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John Bittrolff was one of Heuermann’s more than 200 alleged Google searches related to the Gilgo Beach case, according to his bail application, which detailed thousands of Google searches for explicit pornography and nearby sex workers.
Fox News Digital doesn’t cover many of the Google searches due to their explicit nature, but “John Bitroff (sic)” was listed as #14 in searches (pictured below).
Google searches allegedly made by Heuermann. (DA of Suffolk County)
A PARTICULAR GOOGLE SEARCH
There was one purported Google search that caught Zeman’s eye: “Asian twink tie up porn.”
Twink, according to dictionary.com, is defined as a gay or bisexual young man with a “slender, boyish appearance”.
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“Personally, I always thought it was two killers,” Zeman said. “But one of the bodies found along Ocean Parkway was an Asian man, so that suddenly made me think we’re dealing with one killer all of a sudden.”
The victim he refers to has still not identified himself. He is described as a young, biological man who wears women’s clothing.
Asa Ellerup and Victoria Heuermann walk through a parking lot in New Jersey, Tuesday, July 18, 2023. (Dario Alequin for Fox News Digital)
Law enforcement believes the victim had been dead for about five years when he was found in April 2011. All that remains is a composite drawing.
“I still don’t know (how many killers), and this has been a big problem for Suffolk County from the start,” Zeman said. “It is said that (former police commissioner) Richard Dormer was fired because he got into a fight with the district attorney over whether it was one or two serial killers.
“So this debate about one or two serial killers has been raging since the very early days of this investigation.”
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“NO SENSE MAKES SENSE”
Retired Reno, Nevada Police Lieutenant Joey Walkerwho created the “Serial Defense” program with a podcast and life-saving techniques to fend off sexual assault and serial killers has broken the case for Fox News Digital.
He started the interview by saying, there’s an old saying, “It’s no use,” which is especially true in this criminal case.
Joey Walker, a retired Reno police lieutenant who teaches self-defense, created this diagram to explain the possibilities in the Gilgo Beach cold case (Joey Walker)
He drew a diagram similar to a clock with each number as another possibility. In the middle is the ‘dumping ground’, in this case Gilgo Beach.
With serial offenders of any crime, they’re likely to repeat what they know works, Walker said, so if one person committed all the murders and dumped evidence (or, in this case, bodies/body parts) without getting caught, the “area is safe” and can be used again.
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Then there’s the possibility that a single offender committed some or most of the murders, and coincidentally another killer used the same dump, Walker said.
He used the cases of Ted Bundy and Edmond Kemper to illustrate why serial killers might distribute body parts.
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“Finding human remains of a murder victim in different locations may have a ritualistic component, with the killer using that body part as a souvenir or for their sexual gratification,” Walker said.
Since body parts were found several miles apart, this was likely done on purpose to confuse investigators or thwart identification, which Whitey Bugler did.
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And serial offenders study, read and watch other offenders and “perhaps imitate their methodology, in whole or in part, of their successes,” he said.
According to Walker, Dennis Rader, known as the serial killer “BTK”, wrote in a letter to Fox News Digital that he sees Heuermann as “a clone of me”.
Left, Gilgo Beach suspect Rex Heuermann in an image prosecutors revealed in court documents. Right: Serial killer Dennis Raider, aka BTK, in court in 2005 after being arrested for 10 counts of murder. (Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office, REUTERS/Bo Rader/Pool FA)
Bodies or evidence can be disposed of “on purpose or haphazardly,” and that often depends on the sophistication of the perpetrator, Walker said.
“If the perpetrator is throwing items in different locations, it may be a deliberate attempt to throw the suspicion off of themselves, where it may be related to and directly attributed to them,” he said.
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“I was arrested when I was 59. Married, two kids,” Rader wrote in the letter. “Husband, father has long been a serial killer, stalker, used electronic devices, lives in an undetected neighborhood.”
That said, it will likely be “years, if not ever, before the totality of crimes committed is attributed to one or more individuals and eventually resolved,” Walker said.
NO GUILTY FUN
As it stands, Heuermann is charged with the murders of Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Megan Waterman, 22, and Amber Lynn Costello, 27, and is the prime suspect in the murder of Maureen Brainard-Barnes.
He was charged with six counts of murder (first and second degree for each victim) and pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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Prosecutors have not said whether they believe Heuermann is involved with any of the other six victims at Gilgo Beach.
But his arrest prompted law enforcement agencies across the country, including South Carolina, Las Vegas and Atlantic City, to re-investigate missing persons and cold cases to determine if Heuermann was involved.
Chris Eberhart is a crime and American news reporter for Fox News Digital. Email tips to chris.eberhart@fox.com or on Twitter @ChrisEberhart48.