Law&Crime Sidebar - Gilgo Beach Murders: 5 Most Alarming Pieces of Evidence Removed from Alleged Serial Killer’s Home

Episode Date: July 20, 2023

Gilgo Beach serial killer suspect Rex Heuermann had some odd items in his home that investigators bagged as evidence to prove their case in court. The Law&Crime Network’s Jesse Weber analyzes each piece of the puzzle with Jules Epstein, a criminal law and evidence professor at Temple University Beasley School of Law.LAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergWriting & Video Editing - Michael DeiningerGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa Bein & Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieThey Walk Among AmericaDevil In The DormThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wonderly Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wonderly Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. views shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that

will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. We executed over 300 subpoenas, search warrants pertaining to this individual to find out more information. One of the things that we did is we followed him because We wanted to get an abandonment sample of his DNA, which we were able to do. Some curious items were covered from the search of Rex Huberman's property. What things did the accused Gilgo Beach serial killer have in his possession that may prove pivotal to his case? Professor of Law Jules Epstein comes back on to break it all down.

Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. So I really want to talk about the very latest in the Gilgo Beach Serial. killer case out of New York. I'm talking about the incredible arrest of 59-year-old architect Rex Heuerman for the murders of three women, Melissa Bartholomey, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello. Their bodies were found back in 2010 near that Long Island beach. I'll tell you what, I'm actually from Long Island. I remember following this case about 10 years ago when I was studying criminal law in law school. That's how long I've been following it. Well, you might

recall that there were 11 sets of human remains that were ultimately found in that area. And now it's a question of whether Hewerman is going to be charged with respect to the deaths of any other people. He's actually the main suspect in the 2007 disappearance of Marine Brainerd Barnes. And we know authorities through extensive investigative work have tracked Hewerman to this cold case through all different sorts of evidence, burner phones, junk email accounts that he allegedly used. There was a car linked to the defendant that was tied back to the murder of Costello. There was DNA, specifically from his wife. And more directly for him, tying back to the crime scene, I mean, we're talking about DNA where

apparently authorities matched DNA of a male hair that was taken off of one of the victim's bodies, the burlap that was used to wrap one of the victims. And that was matched to DNA taken off of a pizza crust that was thrown away by Heurman. They collected it from a Manhattan trash can. Pretty incredible work. But what I want to get into today is now what are investigators reportedly finding after searching his property. And for that discussion, it is time to bring back in a good friend of us here on sidebar. Professor Jules Epstein. Professor Epstein is the Edward D. Allbaum, Professor of Law

and Director of Advocacy Programs at Temple University Beasley School of Law. And he joins us once again. Professor, so good to see you. Thank you for having me on and for all the great coverage you do. Well, thank you for that. You are a fan favorite. And I want to start with, because we haven't talked about the case yet. So before we even get into what authorities are reportedly finding and its significance to the investigation, let me just get your overall thoughts on Hewerman's arrest and the evidence that they have against him. If you can summarize real quick, what you think, how strong is it, in your opinion? Because when I'm looking at it, it seems pretty strong. So there's a tremendous circumstantial evidence case against him. There's a tremendous suspicion case against him.

and the fight is going to be about the DNA. And the reason I say it is this. My DNA could be on a body because I killed the person. Or my DNA could be on a body because they were in my car and got out of my car. And we call that transfer DNA. And I have to imagine that that's going to be a concern. Let me just finish answering your question. question this way. There's with everything they've found, does he look guilty? And then how much of that

will be admissible in court to prove guilty? Those may be two very different questions. And I would love to continue as this case progresses where we can talk about that and potentially, you know, at a trial. But talking about evidence that might be admissible, we're trying to understand what police are finding right now. And I think this is really interesting because I want to get into these searches. So the Suffolk County District Attorney Raymond Tierney, he said, quote, we've executed a great number of search warrants over a great many different places and we're looking for everything from large items to molecular items like blood, DNA, trace evidence, hair. But to take a step back, let's talk about a search warrant for a second because usually

what is it listed as items to be searched for in a search warrant. We know that they're looking at his house. We're looking at, they're looking at storage lockers. Walk us through what's supposed to be listed? Well, number one is a search warrant has to have a list. Just part of the United States Constitution is search warrants have to be particular. They can't say, hi, we'd like to search your house for God knows what. So presumably it lists clothing of the victims, souvenir is a horrible term, right, but things kept from the victims, the type of materials used to wrap the bodies. maybe phone records or things showing communications, hopefully they will have a list of particular items that we would logically think could connect to this crime. There's a problem even if they

have the list. And I'm sure that they did because judges are not supposed to sign these wholesale, look for whatever you want, warrants. The last crime, correct me if I'm wrong, was 13 years ago. Mm-hmm. Something like that. As far as we know, right? Because we don't know what else you might have been up to, but yeah. But in terms of the women whose deaths they're investigating, we're going back to 2010.

You mentioned one was 207. So if it was now 2011 and he became a suspect, we'd say, okay, probably likely there's something in his house. Now let's go to 2012. Well, a little less likely. One thing a judge is going to have to decide, we call it in the law, staleness, whether maybe there was probable cause to search his home in 2013, in 2014, what are the odds that items related to the crime would be there 13 years later? Hmm. That's an interesting point. Let me just amplify that for a second. So the way that I understand if they're trying to find evidence, not just to tie him to these three women that he's already charged with, but if they're trying to see if he's connected to other crimes, maybe the other bodies or maybe something they're not familiar with, they're limited in what they can do.

Well, remember, I can't get a warrant for your house for crimes I'm just guessing about. Right. So let's take it just with the three women. women, let's assume they have probable cause. He killed these three women. That's probable cause to arrest. To get probable cause to search, you have to say there's some likelihood that something from that crime used to commit that crime, a link evidentially to that crime, is in his house today. Let me give you an example when I used to teach this. I suppose I'm charged with the theft of ice cream. I don't want to even think of that, but let's let's keep going on with this example. I mean, so friends, right? How long do you think that ice cream is still going to be in my house? That's a good point. Okay, I'm going to eat it, right? Now, if it's a shooting,

well, you probably have the gun. Maybe you keep the gun a year or two later. Maybe you keep the guns longer. If it's a stolen money, I'm going to spend the money. Where is the drop-off point? A prosecutor would argue that in a case like this, with a guy who lives a life like he did, a sort of hermit's life, that there is a longer lifespan for the evidence in the home. A defense attorney would say, Wait a minute. That's just made up guesswork. And we have to have something tangible to say, what are the odds? And if a judge says, whoa, this information is stale, then the, what we call the fruits, the product of the searches could be disallowed at trial. So a big finding is it's stale. Interesting. Okay. Well, that's good to keep in mind.

because now I wanted to get through some of the items that are reportedly found. So they searched his home in Massapequa Park, New York. And I want to start with the guns. Apparently, authorities found between 200 and 300 firearms. They were locked in a vault in his basement, pistols, revolvers, semi-automatic rifles. It only seems like a fraction of those were actually registered with New York State. The Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison told Fox News, anytime anybody has that type of arsenal, we have some concerns.

Why do you think that's of interest to authorities? Well, there are two ways it can be of interest. One is we don't even know how these women died. Right. So Lord knows if we can link a gun or the notion of a gun to any of the women. Separately, there's a doctrine in the law called Plainview. if I'm legally in your house searching for the women's clothing as an example and I see an illegal gun in plain view I was allowed to be there to look for the clothing but oops in right in front of

my face is something illegal I can take it even if it's not in that list on the warrant So it's possible, I haven't read all the papers here, that they could go in and say, we are seizing the guns because some of them are illegal. They may also be seizing the guns, not as evidence, but as I'm going to call it a public safety issue. We've got a home where we're taking a guy out, who knows who's going to do it. we can't have guns left lying around so so are they using it for evidence in the murder cases lord knows is there something illegal about the number maybe or about some of them not registered who knows is there some reason to just for the protection of all of us put them somewhere safe you bet yeah and i think he has permits again for like 92 handguns but maybe some of them are not accounted for and

clearly they didn't want to arrest him in that home because imagine it was a standoff situation could have been very dangerous. We know that they apprehended him on the streets of New York City. I want to move on to this very weird item. Something investigator said was out of place, a doll, a life-sized doll in a glass case that wasn't in any of his children's rooms. That's what's being reported. Why is that of interest?

Why is that being taken out? Okay. the allegation here is that each of these women was a sex worker, an escort. If I understand the allegation, it is that he hired them and then murdered them. And so they are trying to show, I assume, some particular sexual fascination, fetish, or something. I get it that's important from an investigative perspective, whether it's going to be admissible at trial is a different issue. And here's why. If I'm charged with murder, you're not allowed to say, well, in general, Jules is a bad guy, or Jules is a violent guy, or Jules is a sick guy. We're supposed to charge you on what you did, not on your character.

Having a blow-up sex doll, if that's what it is, is what kind of person I am, my character. A prosecutor would argue, no, no, no. We're not using it to say in general, oh, he's sick or he's perverted. We're using it to show it's part of his. fascination with hookers or escorts. They're going to try and make it very linked to the behavior in this case. The defense is going to say, no, that's a sort of general attack. It relates to they took out a bunch of playboys.

Okay. And by the way, if they assume D.N., can they just pick something out if they think there might be DNA on it? They might think they have DNA on it that can match up to DNA on the crime scene or the bodies. Do they just pick things out? Oh, that might have DNA. That would depend on what the warrant says.

Okay. Okay. Because, remember the plain view thing. Number one, let's assume the warrantless bed sheets. I've got that. Yep. Use condoms. I've got that.

And then they see this doll. It's not on the warrant. So then it has to be apparent, plain view, that this is illegal. or evidence. If there's this speculation thing, a judge might say you could not seize it. Let me amplify that for a moment, because this ties into the other thing that they found. And I'm going to tie in the doll with this other piece of evidence. So there was apparently, they removed a portrait of what appears to be a battered woman.

I actually saw the photo. I don't remember if it was in the New York Post or the Daily Mail, but you see it. And it appears to be a blonde woman with bruises on her. face now you might be saying why are they taking it why did they take the doll this is what my take is and i'm curious your take i think it is imperative for investigators to show that those burner phones and those searches on his burner phones are his right and i think you know showing that the burner phones were his it helps to track his location it happens to show that he might have been contacting the victims or the victim's family so it's very important to show those phones

those internet searches are for him now what am i talking about with the searches? I'm going to list some of them out. They're really disgusting, but I think they're important here. One of them is girl begging for rape porn. And again, this is what he allegedly searched on burner phones using fake accounts. Pretty girl with bruised face porn, torture redhead porn, girl with face beat up. So couldn't investigators say, hey, listen, we know this is his phone. We know this is his searches. He's got a portrait of a battered woman. He's got a life-sized sex style, if that's what it is. Can't investigate. Investigators use that to show that this is his property.

This is his phone. The answer is yes as an investigative tool, maybe or maybe not at trial. So here's what's going on. Okay. Obviously, if the phone said his name and it has his thumbprint as the security thing to open it, it's his phone. Right. What you're saying is, I'm going to take two and two and make four. He's got a portrait of battered woman, and then he's got a phone with searches about battered women.

That may not be precisely two and two makes four. That may be one and one make two, but we've got to get to four, but it's partway there. Because sadly, lots of people in this world may have those kind of pictures and may have those kind of interest. but even if even if a judge says you know no no no that's enough that proves it's his phone well that's one message of that picture and of those searches but the other message was we're back to here's a really sick dude here's a really anti-woman violence against woman person we're back to character. You do searches, that's your character. Therefore, you're more likely to hurt women. And that's not allowed. That's not allowed in. That's propensity evidence.

That's propensity evidence. Although I did some research for you today because I want to be on top of this. New York law has a couple of cases that say no. Thoughts are different from propensity. And something like an internet search is a thought. Something like having a portrait is a thought as opposed to, oh, we can show he did it to some other woman, some other time. And so there's at least a couple of cases that says this comes in to show a general hatred against women, therefore a more likely. So they would call it motive, not propensity.

that's, as best I can tell, still accepted law in New York. So each state can have its own, if you will, bandwidth or tolerance of how much of this. Everybody's heard the words prior bad acts, okay? The real technical term in the law is other acts, because they don't have to be prior. They can be after, but they have to link. on every state can have its own bandwidth on how much or how little they allow. I will say bluntly, I was shocked to read what New York says about thoughts being allowable, but they do.

So a New York judge is going to have to deal with that. And by the way, I should make it clear because we have a few more pieces of evidence that we're talking about here or alleged evidence. This is speculation. We're looking at the reports of what they took, looking at pictures of what they took. We're kind of looking through the pieces here, but I think this is a really interesting discussion about what's being taken and what might play a role in his trial, which brings me to another piece.

So the Daily Mail has a picture of investigators placing newspaper clippings in an evidence bin. Now, my take is they appear to be old newspaper clippings. We don't know what they say. We don't know when they're from. I do think it is interesting, if they were clippings, let's assume for a moment, of the Gilgo Beach serial killer, in light of his alleged online search. history. Going back to those burner phones, those fake accounts, he allegedly searched, quote, why could law enforcement not trace the calls made by the Long Island serial killer?

Why hasn't the Long Island serial killer been caught? Long Island killer. Long Island serial killer phone call. Long Island serial killer update. Long Island serial killer update 2022. It goes on and on. And we know that a woman, I think an escort actually came forward recently and said that she went on a date with Rex Ehrman, and he was asking her about the Gilgo Beach serial killer. And by the way, he was also looking up the, or allegedly looking up the victims as well. So I wonder if those newspaper clippings, let's assume they're of the Gilgo Beach killer. I imagine that might come into evidence to show he was looking about it. He was interested in it.

Why else? It's not just a fascination. It's because he was worried about getting caught. So that, unlike having the doll, unlike looking up porn or beaten up women is this case and a fascination with this case certainly has here's the magic word relevance right um most of us don't get involved in other stuff you know and go spend what i do now right my search is probably like his because you asked me to get ready for this case for this program but that's understandable you're talking about it right like i got a pretty

professional excuse. Okay. Normally, right, that doesn't. So that courts could easily say that's relevant. That's in a weird way like souvenirs. Yeah. Right. Some fascination with this case, it certainly should not be enough alone to convict anyone, but it is a piece of relevant evidence that ought to come in. And, you know, speaking of souvenirs, I know they're looking at looking at storage units, his house for souvenirs, trophies, body parts, things that he might have taken really disturbing to think about. Now, Professor, again, I would love to know everything that they took. But the last part that I want to talk about that I think could be significant is it appears

they took a picture of a life jacket. I think that's significant because we think about where the bodies were deposited. What's your take on what they might be trying to find from the life jacket? that one is i'm unclear i couldn't figure that out it could be i mean it's weird because i don't it's not clear they used a boat to deposit the body right as i've i understood it you could drive there um so what that is i don't know whether there's something please remember police don't and wisely don't reveal everything about crimes because if they ever catch someone they want to have some hidden information, and if the person talks about it, that might be an

indicator of guilt. Lord knows, I do know, and maybe this connects with it, that they took out a piece of tarp. And that one makes sense to see if the same kind of tarp as the burlap or whatever it was that the bodies were wrapped in. Right? That's going to be. looking for a forensic match but I'm with you I'm scratching my head I would just say maybe maybe maybe with the life jacket if they think he deposited something into the water um because you maybe he was there's parts or maybe there's bodies that they're not aware of and maybe use that as a way to deposit in the water itself really interesting questions if I have a life jacket in my house today is that any proof i had it in 2010 that's a good point right so we've got a right

or that i maybe it's a newer one but then i had an older one you know we've got to link it back somehow but again two questions are going to be here what is it and were they allowed to take it under the warrant i'll do one last honorable mention don't think it's particularly significant I thought it was interesting. It's kind of sad. They took his cat. I mean, what do they do with the cat? I don't know if they're trying to find evidence of the cat or just take it to a shelter.

What do you think? So my first response was take it to a shelter. On the other hand, I don't know what's wrapped up with the bodies. I also don't know how old the cat is. Yeah. Okay. So we had a cat for 18 years. Our current cat is seven.

The seven-year-old cat wouldn't be very helpful. for an old murder if there's any cat hair on bodies maybe they could be looking for a match there that's totally a guess i you know i'm just glad that they didn't leave the cat in that what is frankly a not pleasant house yeah they talk about how cluttered that house was they call him a monster but uh look he's innocent until proven guilty we have to make it clear but uh look the evidence that they've laid out is is you know pretty significant And by the way, they're also, you know, not only searching his house, the storage lockers, they're looking into things in South Carolina, Las Vegas, seeing if he has a connection, anything there. If you left any evidence, it's a pretty fascinating case. And again, it just happens. So we're kind of in the throes of it. Professor Jules Epstein, you are a pleasure. Thank you so much for taking the time. Really do always appreciate it. All right. Take care, friends. And that's all we have for you here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. Please subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube. Wherever you get your podcasts, I'm Jesse Weber.

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