Suspect in Gilgo Beach killings charged in death of seventh woman

RIVERHEAD, N.Y. — (AP) — The man facing murder charges in a string of deaths known as the Gilgo Beach killings was charged on Tuesday in the death of a seventh woman, The Associated Press reports.

Rex Heuermann was charged with killing Valerie Mack, whose remains were first found on Long Island in 2000. Mack, 24, had been working as an escort in Philadelphia and was last seen by her family that year in New Jersey.

Mack’s partial skeletal remains were first found in Manorville, New York, in 2000, about 50 miles east of where more of her remains were discovered on Gilgo Beach more than 10 years later. They were unidentified until genetic testing revealed Mack’s identity in 2020.

Human hair found with Mack’s remains was sent for testing earlier this year and found to be a likely match with the genetic profile of Heuermann’s daughter, prosecutors said in court papers. His daughter is not accused of any wrongdoing and would have been three or four years old when Mack died.

Heuermann is charged with killing six other women whose remains were found on Long Island. One of the victims he’s accused of killing was from the Charlotte area.

The AP reports that Amber Lynn Costello was living in Wilmington, and had been married to a man from Kannapolis, before moving to New York after a falling out with her family.

Newsday, a news outlet in New York, previously reported that Costello was born in Charlotte and raised in Wilmington. Newsday reporters said Costello left her home on Sept. 2, 2010, but wasn’t seen after that. She was never reported missing.

Costello’s body was found on Dec. 13, 2010.

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In a court filing for the most recent charges, prosecutors said they had recovered a file on a hard drive in Heuermann’s basement that he used to “methodically blueprint” his killings — including checklists with tasks to tick off before, during and afterwards, as well as lessons for “next time.”

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