The green Chevrolet Avalanche seized by the FBI in South Carolina, which investigators have referred to as critical evidence linking Gilgo suspect Rex A. Heuermann to three murders, was returned to Suffolk County on Wednesday.
Authorities with the Suffolk County Crime Lab said the truck carrying the vehicle arrived around 4 a.m.
Multiple news outlets in South Carolina said the vehicle was spotted in the bed of a New York State Police tow truck outside the Chester County Sheriff’s Office on Tuesday.
Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney said a witness had noticed a first-generation Chevrolet Avalanche parked in the driveway of homicide victim Amber Lynn Costello’s residence in West Babylon.
The driver of the Avalanche contacted Costello the night she disappeared, according to court documents filed in Heuermann’s case, which say a witness also told police she saw a dark-colored truck stop by the house shortly after Costello left.
The Chester County Sheriff’s Office in South Carolina said Monday it assisted the Gilgo Beach Task Force and the FBI in obtaining a warrant to seize the vehicle. Both Heuermann and his brother, Craig, own property on a secluded road in Chester.
After the Gilgo Beach Task Force linked a Chevrolet Avalanche pickup truck to Heuermann, the Suffok County Sheriff’s Office shared its physical description, and the locations they identified with cell phone triangulation they called “the box” , with prisoners who knew they were victims of trafficking to see if they had had contact with him. At that time, they could not share any photos of him, Sheriff Errol Toulon told Newsday on Tuesday.
In 2018, at the behest of federal prosecutors, Toulon created a human trafficking unit at the Suffolk County Jail to screen inmates who may have been trafficked. The unit directs those inmates to services, but also collects information for law enforcement, Toulon said.
They didn’t gather any additional information through this, but then checked phone records. They discovered Heuermann had contacted two sex workers by phone but never followed up with them, Toulon said.
The sheriff’s office had identified approximately 310 trafficking victims who were in jail custody and about 190 traffickers. The information has been collected in a database.
After Heuermann’s arrest, members of the human trafficking unit have been showing his photo to current inmates to see if any of them have had contact with him. They also reach out to sex-trafficking victims who are no longer in custody, Toulon said.
That intelligence could be critical to gathering more evidence in the case, he said.
“We see and hear a lot of things that the average police officer would never hear,” Toulon said.
Toulon, who said he had experience with high-profile inmates John Gotti and Bernard Goetz when he worked in New York City corrections, said the prison is taking special precautions to ensure Heuermann’s safety. He is being housed in a special unit, Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Vicki DiStefano said.
Heuermann is being held in Riverhead, according to jail records. Only authorized personnel have access to this unit, and it is being watched and videotaped 24 hours a day. There he will be imprisoned through the legal process. Heuermann can see authorized visitors, but Toulon is also taking steps to screen other visitors who can be there at the same time, he said.
Also, when Heuermann is being moved from one place to another inside the prison, “all movement stops,” Toulon said. “This means all inmate movement is halted.”
Heuermann continues to monitor the suicide. As the jail continues to observe COVID-19 protocols, he is in quarantine for 10 days, DiStefano said. He is in a standard cell with access to a television in the hallway. He is allowed out of his cell for showers and phone calls, she said.
Meanwhile, Suffolk County and New York State police continued to search for a third day at an Amityville storage unit on Sunrise Highway that they said was used by Heuermann.
Crime lab analysts and police were loading up trucks and going through the files and paperwork, one by one, wearing blue gloves. Much of the search remains shrouded behind blue tarps and white tents as police empty the storage unit, where boxes are still stacked inside.
The storage unit is five minutes from Heuermann’s Massapequa Park home, where police said Tuesday that investigators seized more than 200 handguns from a vault inside.
Suffolk police on Tuesday declined to provide more details about the weapons found in the home and whether the suspect had a permit to have them.
Heuermann, 59, is a Manhattan architect who lives in the same First Avenue house where he grew up.
Heuermann was arrested Thursday night on the sidewalk of his Manhattan office and charged with murder in the slayings of three women whose bodies were found in December 2010 in the Gilgo Beach area.
Heuermann pleaded not guilty at his arraignment in Suffolk County Court in Riverhead on Friday to three counts of first- and second-degree murder in the deaths of Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Lynn Costello. The women’s remains, along with those of Maureen Brainard-Barnes, were found near an area of thick vegetation on Gilgo Beach. Heuermann has not been charged in Brainard-Barnes’ murder, although prosecutors called him a “prime suspect.”
The remains of six other victims were later found, but authorities have not linked Heuermann to those murders.
Check back for updates on this developing story.
