Wow this Mary Murphy article has a lot of info from today.
On Tuesday, December 17, 2024, Valerie Mack's name was officially included among LISK victims...
www.marymurphyofficial.com
Valerie Mack (formerly known as "Jane Doe
#6")
Valerie Mack's parents walked slowly, escorted by investigators from the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office, as they left a courtroom in Riverhead, Long Island.
They were nearly two hundred miles from their home in southern New Jersey.
Edwin and Joanne Mack were finally emerging from the shadows in a horrifying serial killer case, following the relatives of other Gilgo Beach victims down a long hallway.
Valerie Mack was known for twenty years as Jane Doe # 6, until her identity was announced on May 28, 2020. This was three years before architect Rex Heuermann was arrested and accused of being the Long Island serial killer, known as LISK.
On Tuesday, December 17, 2024, Valerie Mack's name was officially included among LISK victims, when a superseding indictment was unsealed inside the 4th floor courtroom of Judge Timothy Mazzei. It accused Heuermann of this seventh murder in the Gilgo Beach investigation. But with his hands shackled behind his back, Heuermann loudly proclaimed, "Your Honor, I am not guilty of ANY of these charges." From where I was sitting, very close to a large number of victims' relatives, one woman responded under her breath, "F--k you!"
Rex Heuermann in court December 17, 2024. Pool Photo: James Carbone.
The 20-page bail application released Tuesday by Suffolk County District Attorney Raymond Tierney, part of a request to keep Heuermann remanded before trial, contained more, shocking information about the LISK case. Valerie Mack was one of two dismembered victims found in Manorville. The documents revealed that one hair found on Valerie Mack's left wrist was tied by nuclear DNA testing to Rex Heuermann's daughter, Victoria, who would have been 3 or 4 years old in 2000 at the time of Mack's murder. Once again, prosecutors believe household transfer of family members' DNA turned up on the body of a LISK victim.
Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney announces 7th indictment against accused serial killer Rex Heuermann, with parents of Valerie Mack standing behind him. December 17, 2024.
Prosecutors said in their papers that Valerie Mack, 24, was last seen in Port Republic, New Jersey near the home of her parents', who had adopted her out of the foster care system. She gave birth to a son at age 17 and once lived with the child's father in Wildwood, New Jersey. She was known to be a sex worker who frequented the Philadelphia and Atlantic City areas.
The District Attorney said that on 11/19/2000, a dog walking with hunters in the woods of Manorville, Long Island alerted the group to a black plastic bag wrapped with duct tape. Inside the bag, additional plastic bags contained human remains. The female victim was decapitated. Both of her hands had been severed from her body above the wrists. Part of her right leg was cut off, mid-calf. Authorities later learned this portion of Valerie Mack's leg contained a tattoo with the name of her young son. Pathologists believe the victim was dead two to eight weeks when she was discovered.
Investigators also revealed that when they extracted information from Rex Heuermann's electronic devices, they found his home IP address was used to access Gilgonews.com on May 23, 2020, a Suffolk County police department website that was going to reveal Mack's identity. She was publicly identified five days later.
Prosecutors said Valerie Mack was tied up in rope and alleged that in the months leading up to her 2000 disappearance, Rex Heuermann was accessing pornographic images online that included breast mutilation and the tying up of women with rope.
The bail application made many comparisons between Valerie Mack's killing and the 2003 dismemberment murder of LISK victim, Jessica Taylor, whose torso was also discovered near Mill Road in Manorville. A forensic anthropologist at the Office of Chief Medical Examiner in New York City "analyzed the cut bones of both victims, which led to the conclusion that a hand-powered saw, with similar blade widths, (was) utilized in the dismemberments of both Jessica Taylor and Valerie Mack." The documents also noted the garbage bags found at both dump sites were similar in "color, seal location, knots, perforations, size."
Of particular interest to many reporters were magazine and newspaper articles about the serial killer investigation allegedly found in Heuermann's Manhattan office and his Long Island home.
Shortly after Heuermann's July 2023 arrest, agents from the Gilgo Homicide Task Force said they found a 2016 People magazine issue about the Long Island Serial Killer case in his Manhattan office. The article was titled, "Bodies on the Beach."
Also in 2023, they reported finding a New York Magazine cover story about the case, written in 2016, inside the basement vault of Heuermann's Massapequa Park home. During a follow up search in 2024, investigators said they discovered a New York Post newspaper article about the Valerie Mack and Jessica Taylor murders inside Heuermann's primary bedroom. They concluded in their affidavit that these keepsake articles "indicates the Defendant's attempts to remind himself of the events that occurred through the murders of each victim, revealing Rex A. Heuermann's utter lack of (dis)regard or remorse for his actions or the victims."
2016 People magazine issue about the Long Island Serial Killer case found in Heuermann's Manhattan office.
New York Magazine cover story about the case, written in 2016, found in Heuermann's home.
There was also a Newsday article included in the bail application, a reference to the 1993 story about a woman's body found in the woods of North Sea, a hamlet in Southampton. The victim was Sandra Costilla of Queens. DA Tierney charged Rex Heuermann with the murders of both Sandra Costilla and Jessica Taylor back in June 2024.
Newsday Article, 1993.
There were many references in Tuesday's proceedings to the HK Planning Document extracted from Rex Heuermann's computer that allegedly served as a "blueprint" for the murders. Prosecutors believe the defendant generally preferred smaller victims and pointed out the document's notation that SMALL IS GOOD.
The planning document also made reference to foam drain cleaner as a supply the alleged killer would need. In the latest documents, prosecutors said Heuermann reached out to a plumber in October 2000 and later paid $283.83 to another company to check his "mainline" drain.
HK Planning Document extracted from Rex Heuermann's computer.
On April 4, 2011, Valerie Mack's skull, hands, and right foot were discovered along the north side of Ocean Parkway, just east of Gilgo Beach. This was about four months after a police dog made the initial discovery of the 'Gilgo Four' victims, women Heuermann is also accused of killing. Valerie Mack's remains were found close to a female toddler who's been linked, by DNA, to the Gilgo victim known as Peaches. Heuermann has not been charged in the Peaches case.
www.crimewatchers.net
