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New charges for alleged Gilgo Beach serial killer cast scrutiny on another man's murder conviction
https://apnews.com/article/gilgo-beach-killings-rex-heuermann-john-bittrolf-eb7dc3c07639f77493d4f01a2c29ea7eNew charges for alleged Gilgo Beach serial killer cast scrutiny on another man’s murder conviction
BY JAKE OFFENHARTZ
Updated 6:33 PM EDT, June 7, 2024
NEW YORK (AP) — For years prosecutors saw a connection in the killings of three young women who disappeared in the winter of 1993 and 1994, their nude bodies found strangled, beaten and left in similar poses in the Long Island brush.
In new charges unveiled Thursday, prosecutors said Rex Heuermann — the man already accused in a string of deaths known as the Gilgo Beach serial killings — was responsible for the death of one of the women, Sanda Costilla. The findings, authorities said, indicate that Heuermann began hunting victims more than a decade earlier than previously thought.
That in turn has raised questions about the conviction of another man, John Bittrolff, who is incarcerated for the murder of the other two women — Rita Tangredi and Colleen McNamee — and who prosecutors once considered a suspect in Costilla’s death.
Bittrolff’s lawyers have long accused prosecutors of relying on dubious forensics to convict him. They say the new charges against Heuermann cast further doubt on the case against their client, who has maintained his innocence since being sentenced to 50 years to life in 2017.
[...]
BY JAKE OFFENHARTZ
Updated 6:33 PM EDT, June 7, 2024
NEW YORK (AP) — For years prosecutors saw a connection in the killings of three young women who disappeared in the winter of 1993 and 1994, their nude bodies found strangled, beaten and left in similar poses in the Long Island brush.
In new charges unveiled Thursday, prosecutors said Rex Heuermann — the man already accused in a string of deaths known as the Gilgo Beach serial killings — was responsible for the death of one of the women, Sanda Costilla. The findings, authorities said, indicate that Heuermann began hunting victims more than a decade earlier than previously thought.
That in turn has raised questions about the conviction of another man, John Bittrolff, who is incarcerated for the murder of the other two women — Rita Tangredi and Colleen McNamee — and who prosecutors once considered a suspect in Costilla’s death.
Bittrolff’s lawyers have long accused prosecutors of relying on dubious forensics to convict him. They say the new charges against Heuermann cast further doubt on the case against their client, who has maintained his innocence since being sentenced to 50 years to life in 2017.
[...]