LBI double murder trial: Cache of guns found, but none the murder weapon

TOMS RIVER - Days after an elderly Surf City man and his live-in girlfriend were found brutally slain in their waterfront Surf City home, investigators found blood and ammunition in his daughter's camper and a cache of guns and more bullets in her Pennsylvania home, investigators testified Thursday.

But, none of the six handguns seized from Sherry Lee Heffernan's home left the shell casings found at the crime scene, a firearms expert testified at Heffernan's trial on charges she murdered her father, John Enders, 87, and his girlfriend, Francoise Pitoy, 75.

The expert, Heather Dover, a senior forensic chemist for the Ocean County Sheriff's Office, testified that the shell casings found at Enders' Surf City could have been fired from either a Glock Model 17 9mm handgun, a Glock Model 19 9mm handgun or a ghost gun, which is a term given to weapons manufactured without serial numbers so that they can't be traced.

Joseph Chester testified earlier Thursday that, in addition to the six handguns and boxes of ammunition seized from Heffernan's home in Landenburg, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 5, 2021, investigators also found  a $599 receipt from Cabela's sporting goods store made out to Heffernan for the purchase of a Glock Model 17 9mm handgun.

There was no Glock Model 17 9mm handgun found in the extensive search of Heffernan's huge home, Chester testified.

Chester is a Berkeley patrolman who was working as a crime scene detective for the sheriff's office at the time Heffernan's home was searched by him and other investigators from the sheriff's office, Ocean County Prosecutor's Office and Pennsylvania State Police.

Chester testified that investigators did find boxes of 9mm ammunition in the home.

And Dover later testified that the shell casings found at the crime scene would have come from 9mm ammunition.

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Being questioned by defense attorney Steven Altman, Dover conceded that type of ammunition can be purchased at any firearms or sporting goods store in the country or perhaps in the world.

Enders and Pitoy were found murdered in Enders' waterfront home on North Seventh Street in Surf City on Oct. 3, 2021, after Pitoy's daughter, who lives in Norfolk, Virginia, called Surf City police to perform a welfare check on the couple when she couldn't get in touch with them.

Kristin Pressman, supervising assistant Ocean County prosecutor, told the jury in her opening statement on Wednesday that both victims had been shot in the face and repeatedly stabbed.

She said the state could prove through license-plate readers, surveillance cameras and cell phone information that Heffernan's white Winnebago camper made a trip from her house in Pennsylvania to her father's house in Surf City on Sept. 29, 2021, and then back to Pennsylvania.

Amanda Scheuermann, a detective with the sheriff's crime scene unit, said she searched Heffernan's Winnebago on Oct. 6, 2021, and found blood in the passenger seat and red staining on the steering wheel believed to be blood.

Also among the items found in the camper was a knife, a box of ammunition and magazine for a .22-caliber gun and a shoulder holster, Scheuermann said.

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Caitlin McQuade, who works for the latent evidence bureau of the sheriff's office, testified that footprints found in Enders' kitchen matched Heffernan's right foot. Like fingerprints, no two persons' footprints are alike, she told the jury. But, McQuade said there was no way to tell when the footprints were left there.

During the search of Heffernan's home, investigators found different versions of Enders' will from various dates among documents strewn over the dining room table, Chester testified.

Enders' grandson, Andrew Vero, who is Heffernan's nephew and the son of the defendant's sister, testified on Wednesday that he learned after his grandfather's funeral that he was the sole heir of his grandfather's estate. That estate included the six-bedroom waterfront home in Surf City.

The trial, before Superior Court Judge Kimarie Rahill, is expected to resume on Tuesday.

Kathleen Hopkins, a reporter in New Jersey since 1985, covers crime, court cases, legal issues and just about every major murder trial to hit Monmouth and Ocean counties. Contact her at khopkins@app.com.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: LBI murder victim's daughter had cache of guns in her home: cops