Ex-wife of Gilgo Beach serial killer convicted of CT mom’s murder says she sleeps in his ‘kill room’
Convicted Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann confers with his attorney Michael Brown during a court hearing at Suffolk County Court on June 17, 2025 in Riverhead, New York.
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The ex-wife of Rex Heuermann, the Long Island architect who pleaded guilty in the Gilgo Beach killings this month, including the murder of a Connecticut mother, told a documentary crew that she sleeps in her husband’s “kill room.”
Asa Ellerup, who divorced Heuermann after his arrest nearly three years ago, said she remodeled the Massapequa Park home’s basement where the now-convicted serial killer admitted to murdering several of his victims.
“This whole basement looks very different, it’s been completely gutted and redone, new floor, new walls, new moldings, new doors,” Ellerup said Thursday in the finale episode of the Peacock series “The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets.”
Ellerup told the documentary that she stayed in the room for about a month before Heuermann pleaded guilty on April 8 because she feels spiritual. She also expressed remorse for the victims.
Heuermann’s daughter, Victoria, said in the documentary that her father admitted to committing the murders and claimed that “his demons got to him.” She also said her father confessed to not seeing the victims as human, NBC reported.
Heuermann, 62, pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree murder and four counts of second-degree murder in the seven killings, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office.
He was originally arrested in July 2023, ending a more than decade-long search for the killer. According to court documents, the murders began in 1993 and continued into 2010, spanning at least 17 years.
Heuermann pleaded guilty in the deaths of seven women: Connecticut resident Maureen Brainard Barnes, Megan Waterman, Amber Costello, Sandra Costilla, Jessica Taylor, Valerie Mack and Melissa Barthelemy. He also admitted to killing 34-year-old Karen Vergata.
Brainard-Barnes, a Norwich resident, was 25 years old and a mother of two children when she went missing in 2007. Officials have said all the victims were involved in sex work.
The first victims were found in the Long Island area of Gilgo Beach in 2010. Dubbed the “Gilgo Four,” the women were identified as Barthelemy, Waterman, Costello and Brainard-Barnes.
Heuermann initially was charged in the deaths of Barthelemy, Waterman and Costello, but was later indicted in the killings of Brainard-Barnes, Taylor, Costilla and Mack.
Heuermann was connected to the crimes by several “burner cellphones,” a pizza crust he discarded in Manhattan and a “first generation” Chevrolet Avalanche registered in his name in 2010, according to a 32-page court document filed by prosecutors in 2023.
Investigators determined that hairs recovered from Barthelemy, Waterman and Costello were linked forensically to Heuermann and members of his immediate family, who were out of state at time of the disappearances.
