The convicted Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann confessed to his ex-wife that he killed multiple women in the basement of their family home while she was away, according to a new documentary.
Asa Ellerup, who finalised her divorce from Heuermann in March 2025 after 27 years of marriage, said he told her he had killed eight women. In a clip from Peacock's The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets, she recalled asking him: "So Mr Heuermann, I understand that you are confessing to me on these murders. Can you please tell me how many of these women did you kill?" He replied: "Eight?" When she pressed him on the identity of the eighth, because he had only been charged with seven, he said the killings took place in his room downstairs, all except one.
Investigators later discovered a soundproof, vault-like room in the couple's Massapequa home, along with hundreds of guns and detailed plans for the murders. Heuermann pleaded guilty on 8 April to seven murders committed between 1993 and 2010, and also admitted to the uncharged killing of Karen Vergata, who went missing in 1996. His victims included the "Gilgo Four" – Amber Lynn Costello, Megan Waterman, Melissa Barthelemy and Maureen Brainard-Barnes – as well as Valerie Mack, Jessica Taylor and Sandra Costilla. He used strangulation, dismembered some victims and wrapped them in burlap; hairs found on the material helped link him to the crimes.
Suffolk County prosecutor Ray Tierney said Heuermann "walked among us playacting as a normal suburban dad when all along he was targeting these women for death." He added: "He thought that by killing them, he could silence them forever and get away with murder. But he was wrong." Ellerup's lawyer, Bob Macedonio, said the family had endured "an extremely emotional and painful process" and asked that the focus remain on the victims and their families. Heuermann's attorney, Michael Brown, said his client pleaded guilty to spare relatives from a trial. Heuermann is scheduled to be sentenced to multiple life terms on 17 June.
Ellerup's comments feature in the final episode of the four-part documentary series, which begins airing on Thursday.
