‘Powerful’ Evidence Found at Gilgo Beach Suspect’s Home

Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said authorities have gathered “very powerful” DNA evidence during the two week long search of the home of Rex Heuermann, the suspect in the Gilgo Beach murders.

In his first interview since announcing he would prosecute the case, Tierney told Top Story with Tom Llamas that search dogs located several electronic devices in the home and confirmed that a large cement gun safe was found.

When asked about the “single biggest piece of evidence” he’s seen, Tierney said, “I think it’s a combination of a number of things, but the DNA evidence, I think, is very powerful.”

While the cadaver dogs have not found anything at Heuermann’s home, Tierney said that the electronic-sniffing dogs pointed to “a number of electronic devices” that were “hidden amongst the clutter” that were recovered.

“This is kind of interesting,” Llamas said. “I’ve never heard this. The dogs were used to recover electronic devices, I’m going to assume, cell phones?”

“Cell phones or smart devices, computers, laptops,” Tierney said. “The use of dogs — there is currency sniffing dogs, there’s electronic device sniffing dogs, and there’s cadaver dogs, just to name a few.”

Heuermann had nearly 300 guns in the home, which he stored in a “block cement room with a metal door,” Tierney said.

“It was reported that it was soundproof — I don’t believe it’s actually soundproof,” he added.

Responding to Llamas’ question if the suspect could walk into the safe with the body of a victim, Tierney said, “Potentially, but by the time we got there, the room was cluttered. So again, there’s no evidence either way to say.”

Heuermann, a 59-year-old architect, has been charged with murder in the deaths of three of the 11 victims in a long-unsolved spate of killings known as the Gilgo Beach murders.

He has lived for decades across a bay where the remains were found and is charged with killing Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello. Heuermann is also considered the prime suspect in another killing, authorities said.

A renewed investigation linked Heuermann to a pickup truck that a witness reported seeing when one of the victims went missing in 2010 and he was arrested in Massapequa two weeks ago.

His DNA was ultimately recovered by detectives and matched to genetic material recovered from the bodies, which were found bound and hidden in dense underbrush along a secluded beach highway.