Gilgo Beach Monster Rex Heuermann Finally Shipped Out of Long Island in Chains – After Ex-Wife’s Brutal Parting Shot: ‘He Got Exactly What He Deserved!’
Good riddance.
The ex-wife of Long Island serial killer Rex Heuermann said Thursday that he got exactly what he deserved, even as the hulking murderer was transferred upstate to begin serving a life sentence for the killings of eight sex workers.
“She believes Rex got what he deserves,” Bob Macedonio, attorney for Heuermann’s former spouse, Asa Ellerup, told The Post. “She believes the sentence was 100% appropriate, and her thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families.”
Heuermann, 62, was sentenced to three life terms in Suffolk County court on Wednesday after pleading guilty to strangling his victims between 1993 and 2010, torturing them, and disposing of their bodies.
The convicted killer was transferred Thursday morning from the Suffolk County jail to Green Haven Correctional Facility in Dutchess County, according to the county sheriff’s office and state officials.
“Rex Heuermann is currently undergoing admission processing at Green Haven Correctional Facility, one of the department’s designated intake facilities,” a spokesperson for the state Department of Correction and Community Supervision said in an email.
Officials have not disclosed which prison will ultimately house Heuermann permanently.
The 6-foot-4 architect from Massapequa Park admitted to killing eight women and dumping their remains along isolated stretches of Long Island, where they were discovered beginning in December 2010.
The murders remained unsolved until authorities reopened the investigation in 2022, leading to Heuermann’s arrest the following year, aided in part by DNA recovered from a discarded pizza box.
In April, Heuermann confessed to killing Amber Lynn Costello, 27; Megan Waterman, 22; Melissa Barthelemy, 24; and Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25 — known collectively as the “Gilgo Four” — as well as Valerie Mack, 24; Jessica Taylor, 20; and Sandra Costilla, 28, the first victim he killed in 1993.
He also admitted to the murder of Karen Vergata, 34, whose 1996 killing had not previously been linked to him.
All but one of the victims were brutally restrained and tortured to death in a “kill room” located in the family’s basement while Ellerup and the couple’s two children were away.
During an emotional sentencing hearing in Riverhead on Wednesday, 13 relatives of the victims confronted Heuermann for the first time and delivered heartbreaking impact statements.
“Look at me while I’m talking,” Melissa Barthelemy’s sister, Amanda Funderburg, told Heuermann.
Funderburg was only 15 years old when her sister was murdered in 2009 and was later subjected to cruel, threatening, and mocking phone calls from Heuermann describing the killing.
“I was forced to live with crippling anxiety, depression, PTSD, and a shattered nervous system, constantly staring at my phone,” Funderburg told him. “Because of the several times you called me from my sister’s phone, telling me she was a whore.”
Judge Timothy Mazzei, who wiped tears from his eyes while listening to the victims’ statements, then asked Heuermann if he wished to speak, sharply ordering him, “Stand up!”
“There are no words I can say, but I am responsible for what was said in this room today,” Heuermann said. “The words I would say have no meaning, and I’m going to leave it there at this time.”
The judge then addressed him directly.
“I know that you’re sorry you got caught. I assume that you’re sorry for what you did to your wife and children,” Mazzei said. “You’ve been described as a very big man, but you’re a disgusting and despicable small man — if you’re a man at all — and you’re a coward.”
The judge then turned to court officers and ordered, “Get him out of here.”
