Gilgo Beach suspect Rex Heuermann to stand trial shortly after Labor Day

(RIVERHEAD, N.Y.) — Accused Gilgo Beach, New York, serial killer Rex Heuermann will stand trial shortly after Labor Day, a judge said during a Tuesday hearing.

Heuermann has pleaded not guilty to killing seven women whose remains were found on Long Island.

The trial date comes as Heuermann requests to suppress certain evidence and dismiss one of the charges.

Among the statements the defense is trying to exclude is when Heuermann was arrested outside his Midtown Manhattan office in 2023, prosecutors quoted him saying, “What is this about?” and “It’s a mistake.” Prosecutors also quoted him asking the officers and agents, “What did I do?” according to the defense filing.

Also, when court officers reviewed Heuermann’s property after his arrest, he allegedly said of his $6,000 watch, “I guess I won’t be needing that,” according to the court filing.

Defense attorney Danielle Coysh wrote that the statements “were involuntarily made and may not be used in evidence against the defendant.”

The defense is also seeking to suppress evidence seized from Heuermann’s home, office, cars and a rented storage unit, along with DNA evidence. The judge has already denied an attempt by Heuermann to exclude DNA, but now the defense argued the DNA evidence was obtained through an unreasonable search of a Manhattan garbage can, where investigators said they discovered discarded pizza crust that links Heuermann to the murders.

In the same filing, Heuermann’s attorneys are seeking to dismiss the murder charge for the 1993 death of Sandra Costilla. 

Prosecutors linked Heuermann to a hair lifted from Costilla’s shirt, but the defense calls that insufficient.

“This evidence, even if accepted as true, does not establish that Mr. Heuermann killed Sandra Costilla, nor that he acted with the intent to cause her death,” Coysh said. “The prosecution presented no eyewitness testimony, surveillance footage, digital evidence, phone records, fingerprint impressions, confession, or murder weapon linking Rex A. Heuermann to this crime.”’

The judge gave the Suffolk County district attorney’s office until March to respond to the defense’s requests.