What we know about Gilgo Beach suspected serial killer Rex Heuermann's family
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The suspect busted for the Gilgo Beach murders is a twice-married architect quietly raising two children — including a son with special needs — in the ramshackle Long Island home he grew up in.
Rex Heuermann’s stunned neighbors in Massapequa Park were nearly united Friday in calling him a quiet businessman and “regular family man.”
Among them was actor Billy Baldwin, 60, who tweeted his shock at waking to “learn that the Gilgo Beach serial killer suspect was my high school classmate” from Berner High School’s class of 1981.
“Married, two kids, architect. ‘Average guy… quiet, family man.’ Mind-boggling,” the local-born actor wrote.
“Massapequa is in shock.”
The 59-year-old architect was raised with his brother, Craig, in the unkempt 1956 home on 1st Avenue that is directly across the bay from where 11 bodies have been found strewn since 2010.
He bought the house from his mom, Dolores, for $170,000 in 1994, according to property records.
That was the same year he started his company, RH Architecture Design, based on Fifth Avenue in midtown Manhattan, where he was arrested late Thursday.
His daughter was among his staff there — and he also raised a special needs son, according to neighbors.
Here’s what we know so far about the suspect’s family:
HIS WIFE
Heuermann is married to Asa Ellerup, according to neighbors and reports, which say she is of Icelandic heritage.
Ellerup, also 59, is listed as living in the same Massapequa Park home — and Heuermann can be seen looking her way in the only photo of herself on her Facebook page.
However, it gives little other information about her.
Next-door neighbor Etienne DeVilliers, a retired New York City firefighter, could only describe her as “quiet.”
Heuermann’s wife was equally mum Friday when she showed up at Suffolk County Court in Riverhead ahead of his expected arraignment later today.
“Please leave me alone. I will not be saying anything,” she told Newsday, which did not confirm her name but said she told court personnel she was Heuermann’s wife.
EX-WIFE
Heuermann was just 26 when he first married in New Brunswick, New Jersey, according to a 1990 wedding announcement showing him smiling in spectacles in his wedding snap.
His first wife, Elizabeth Ryan, was described as a “graduate of St. Peter’s High School” also in New Brunswick as well as Montclair State College, where she got a degree in business administration.
At the time she was a junior planner at a New Jersey office supplies company.
Heuermann was just an intern at an architecture company at the time, four years before he started his own firm. His brother, Craig, was his best man.
It was not immediately clear when that marriage ended — or why — and attempts to reach Ryan were unsuccessful Friday.
However, she has lived at her current home for around 15 years, according to neighbors there who told The Post she has been split from Heuermann for at least that long.
DAUGHTER
Heuermann’s 26-year-old daughter Victoria was proudly listed as just four key members of his “team” on his company website Friday — until it got yanked soon after The Post identified him as the suspect.
The daughter was pictured grinning in sunglasses, without getting a specific title.
It appears to have been a relatively new gig, however, with her LinkedIn describing her as a “sales associate” at Macy’s until a few years ago.
She worked at the Manhattan megastore while studying at the New York Institute of Technology, where she recently graduated with a BFA in Fine Arts in 2019, her profile said.
“I know 3D/2D Animation, Modeling, Sculpting, Autodesk Maya/Mudbox, ZBrush, ToonBoom Harmony, Photoshop, Illustrator, and editing in After Effects and Premier,” she wrote — saying she was “looking for a job in animation,” rather than her dad’s architectural business.
Attempts to reach her were not immediately successful Friday, and the company she worked at with her dad did not respond to messages seeking comment.
“She’s very shy,” said DeVilliers, the next-door neighbor.
“A very nice girl.”
SPECIAL NEEDS SON
Neighbors saw less of Heuermann’s son, whom some sources suggested was his stepson.
“He has a partially disabled kid. A very nice kid,” DeVilliers said of the boy, who does not appear to be listed on the property records.
“We spoke frequently, every day. And his kid is a nice kid, a special needs kid,” DeVilliers also told CBS News.
“The guy’s been quiet. Never really bothers anybody. We are kind of shocked.”
Who is Gilgo Beach serial killer suspect Rex Heuermann?
A suspected serial killer has been arrested over the notorious Gilgo Beach murders in Long Island, The Post can confirm.
Rex Heuermann, 59, a married dad of two and architect at a New York City firm, has a home on 1st Avenue in Massapequa Park, sources told The Post.
His arrest is tied to the “Gilgo Four,” four women — Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Megan Waterman, 22, Amber Lynn Costello, 27, and Maureen Brainard-Barnes, 25 — found wrapped in burlap within days of each other in 2010.
The body of Barthelemy was first found along Ocean Parkway on Dec. 11, 2010, sparking fears of a serial killer in the area.
By spring 2011, the number of bodies had climbed to 10, including eight women as well as an unidentified man and toddler.
Heuermann’s arrest comes after Suffolk County’s new police commissioner created a special Gilgo Beach Homicide Investigation Task Force in February 2022.
PARENTS
Heuermann proudly claimed that his dad, Theo, had been an “aerospace engineer who built satellites” — while also working as a cabinet maker.
He passed on that skill to the suspect, who said he still makes furniture — and learned to always rely on “a hammer” when he needs to “persuade something.”
Records show Theo Heuermann died in 1975, when he was 50 and his son would have been just 11.
His mother, Dolores, appears to still be alive, according to records, which suggest she is 93.
She sold the 1st Avenue home she raised her family in to Heuermann in 1994, the year the US suffered the so-called Great Bond Massacre financial crisis.
Heuermann later confirmed that the recession spurred his decision to open his own firm helping companies with NYC’s building department.
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