Gilgo Beach murder suspect's wife files for divorce as former escort recalls alleged encounter
Authorities say Rex Heuermann's wife of 27 years likely had no idea he was living a “double life” as an alleged serial killer.
Less than a week after Rex Heuermann was charged in the so-called Gilgo Beach murders, his wife of 27 years has filed for divorce, her attorney said Wednesday — one of several new developments in the shocking case.
Authorities believe Heuermann, a 59-year-old architect, was leading a double life and that Asa Ellerup, also 59, likely did not know that her husband was behind the serial killings of women whose remains were found along a stretch of beach of Long Island’s South Shore more than a decade ago.
But they are not ruling anything out.
Last week, Heuermann was arrested and charged with murder in the deaths of three of the 11 victims in a long-unsolved string of killings: Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello. He is also the prime suspect in the 2007 disappearance and death of a fourth woman, Maureen Brainard-Barnes, according to Suffolk County prosecutors, but has yet to be charged.
‘It is what it is’
Ellerup was at the couple’s Massapequa Park, N.Y., home they share with their daughter and Heuermann’s stepson last Thursday when police informed her that they had just taken her husband into custody near his office in midtown Manhattan on suspicion of murder.
“When we told the wife, she was shocked, she was embarrassed,” Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison told Fox 5 on Wednesday. “But there was a point where we showed her certain pictures and she said, ‘OK, it is what it is.'”
According to authorities, fragments of hair found on or near three of the victims were later confirmed through DNA testing to belong to Ellerup. Prosecutors believe the hair was unintentionally carried by Heuermann on his clothes and transferred to the victims during the alleged murders.
Although her hair was found with the victims, Ellerup was out of town at the time of the killings, while Heuermann was “alone in the tristate area,” Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said during a Friday news conference.
CNN reports that authorities had been surveilling Heuermann and his family for months after they identified him as a suspect in early 2022, and collected DNA samples from bottles taken out of their garbage.
Heuermann ‘traumatized’ by arrest, lawyer says
Michael Brown, Heuermann’s defense attorney, told ABC News that his client appeared “traumatized” at his arraignment Friday on Long Island.
Heuermann was assigned to Brown, a Suffolk County criminal defense attorney, at the arraignment. Brown said he later met with him at the county jail.
“Nothing struck me as unusual about him,” Brown said. “He was articulate, he was intelligent, he was soft-spoken.”
Heuermann pleaded not guilty and is being held without bail. His next court date is scheduled for Aug. 1.
Former escort recalls alleged encounter
Nicole Brass, a 34-year-old former escort, spoke to the New York Daily News about an encounter she says she had with Heuermann years ago.
Brass told the paper that Heuermann wanted to meet her in a hotel room near Massapequa Park, but that she felt uncomfortable and asked him to meet her at a seafood restaurant in Port Jefferson instead.
During their conversation at dinner, Brass said, Heuermann seemed “totally normal” — until he brought up the Gilgo Beach murders.
“When he spoke, something about his body language changed, the look in his eyes changed,” Brass said. “And it seemed like talking about the victims was enjoyable for him.”
She said Heuermann’s tone while he talked about the murders made her think that he was “visualizing” them and “getting off [on] what he was saying.”
“It was really weird, and it gave me the worst gut feeling. I was so scared at the end of it,” Brass said. “I didn’t try to keep the dinner going long after that.”
