Cati Blauvelt: Death of a Soldier’s Wife | Full Episode

…

In the soft South Carolina night in the city of Simpsonville, Katie Blauvelt was missing.

It had been two fearful days for her mom, Patty Piver.

“I just was terrified that something was going to happen to her.

” Then, past midnight, October 26, 2016, investigators Cheryl Scoffield and Keith Morecraft were dispatched to the scene.

Katie’s mangled body had been found in an abandoned farmhouse.

22 years old.

A knife blade left in her body.

There was a rectangular concrete box, kind of in the center of the basement.

We found Katie’s body inside of that box.

Her body had basically been folded into this box.

It was a picture of what you would see in a horror movie.

Katie’s mom was overwhelmed.

“I was totally empty inside.

She did not deserve to be murdered.

” Katie’s stepsister, Jennifer Piver, “I just prayed and cried, and just sick.

Just sick.

” Morecraft and another investigator went to tell John Blauvelt his wife’s body had been found.

“We went to make the death notification.

I’m so sorry for your loss.

” There, at first, Blauvelt appeared distressed, but as the conversation progressed, his demeanor changed.

He didn’t ask normal questions, such as “Where did you find her? How did she die?” He wasn’t shocked by the news.

He didn’t seem to be at all.

What did that suggest to you? That he knew how she had died.

He knew where her body was.

John Blauvelt did have one question, but it wasn’t about Katie.

“Am I being charged with a crime?” Because he’s recording me and I’m not comfortable with that.

“You’re not being charged with a crime right now.

” Right away, you sensed this could be our guy? “I was pretty confident at the time.

” But they couldn’t arrest him on a feeling first.

Morecraft and Scoffield had evidence to gather and a case to build.

But just as they got started, John Blauvelt took to the road, traveling with him Hannah Thompson, his new girlfriend, all of 17.

How concerned were you about Hannah’s safety? If he was willing to kill his own wife, there’s no telling what kind of danger Hannah Thompson would have been in by fleeing with him.

But John Blauvelt hadn’t always been considered threatening.

Back in 2014, in this quiet city of some 20,000, he was a welcome part of the community.

The larger-than-life public face of the U.

S.

Army.

A person of principle.

Someone willing to sacrifice for his country.

These are all admirable traits, right? Exactly.

It was then that John met Katie, just yards from his recruiting office at this sub shop where she worked.

Katie turned 20, John was 26.

They started dating and they just hit it off.

She’s lovable, caring, funny.

They wouldn’t fall in love with her.

In the summer of 2015, recruiter John Blauvelt convinced Katie to enlist, but after just two months, a health issue prevented her from finishing her training.

They found a problem with her spine.

She got a medical discharge out of the army.

While Katie’s military hopes were dashed, John told friends he had found his calling.

He loved his military career.

That’s one thing we learned: his career was everything to him.

With his war stories about his deployments in Iraq, his sharp uniform, decorated with service ribbons, John impressed local teenagers.

“He had all his ducks in a row.

.

.

almost like a role model,” right? “Almost like a role model.

”

Ally Somerville, a close friend of Katie, says she often ate lunch with John at his recruiting booth in her school.

She adds, “He also sometimes showed up at local hangouts.

” “I thought he was cool.

He was very interested in your life, what you were up to in things.

Yeah, he made sure I was okay.

” But as he began dating Katie, her family was never half sure about John Blauvelt.

“I don’t think I ever had a meaningful conversation with him.

” Did he seem interested in you, in family? “No, not at all.

”

Then after about a year, and seemingly out of the blue, Katie surprised her family with an alarming announcement.

She says, “Oh, by the way,” she said, “Me and John got married.

” And I’m in shock.

She said, “Oh, we got married at the courthouse.

” They went on the honeymoon, but within two months, that honeymoon was over.

Staff Sergeant John Blauvelt and his new bride were putting down roots in the community.

Katie had taken a job at the local PetSmart.

“Yeah, she’s going to love that.

” And she did.

She was passionate about animals.

“This could be a career for her.

”

As for John, he already owned this four-bedroom home in Fountain Inn, right next to Simpsonville, where investigator Cheryl Scoffield worked.

Once they got married, this is the house that they were supposed to move into and have a family.

She wanted a family.

She wanted to have kids.

Katie moved in, and soon the house was crowded with kids, but not the kind Katie imagined.

Unfortunately, the only kids that were here were the teenagers that John invited.

John had invited Katie’s niece to stay with them, and later, Hannah Thompson and Ally Somerville crashed there too.

Ally says it became a party destination for kids from their high school, where John often worked as an army recruiter.

“We were just smoking weed all day, every day.

” And how old were you then? “16.

” And Ally claimed it wasn’t just weed that was the draw.

She said at times there was booze, acid, and cocaine.

“This is with the U.

S.

Army recruiter?” “Right.

U.

S.

Army recruiter letting his party at his house? Like, that’s.

.

.

this is awesome.

”

Patty says it wasn’t long before Katie grew frustrated with all of the partying and told John it had to stop.

“Her dream house turned into a party house, right?” “And that’s the last thing your sister wanted, right?” “Absolutely.

” As Katie and Blauvelt drifted, Hannah Thompson was there to fuel the fire.

“Hannah absolutely despised Katie.

”

What was the nature of Hannah’s relationship with John? As time went on, Hannah became John’s puppy.

“Anytime that John would tell her to do something, she would do it.

” It was all too much for Katie.

According to police records, after being married less than three months, Katie moved out.

Captain Scoffield says, “John and Hannah wasted no time.

She moved into John Blauvelt’s bedroom in this house.

”

When Katie moved out.

.

.

“Whoa, that’s creepy.

Like, you’re in your late 20s and she’s 17, dude.

Like, you’re not supposed to be doing stuff like this.

” Hannah’s father went to the police and told them he hadn’t seen his daughter for two weeks.

That night, on February 26th, 2016, cops showed up at John Blauvelt’s house.

When they arrived, what happens? “They tried to make contact with John, and Katie refused to come outside.

Ally Somerville was inside the house with John and some other minors when police arrived, and John was like, ‘Lock the door, nobody go outside.

‘

It is a case that has haunted the public for more than 13 years and many feared that the Gilgo Beach murders may never be solved.

The officer located a body.

It seemed to be wrapped in burlap, which didn’t make any sense.

The crime scene gets expanded.

I’m called and chief, we found another set of remains.

They find another one and another one.

We were dealing with a serial killer.

Well, they’re available.

They’re vulnerable and very petite.

This killer has a type, right? Does he want the petite body because he wants to feel more empowered and more in control? I want the world to know like my sister mattered.

I want answers.

I just want answers.

An arrest more than a decade in the making in a serial killer case that’s baffled law enforcement and the public.

59-year-old Rex Herman plead not guilty.

I dropped my phone.

I couldn’t believe it.

So, just who is Rex Herman? An architect who ran a company called RH Consultants and Associates.

Rex.

Hello.

How you doing? Good to see you.

When a job that should have been routine suddenly becomes not routine.

Yeah.

I get the phone call.

Rex Herman is a mystery man.

Rex is capable of presenting himself one way to one person, one way to another person.

My first memory of Rex was that he was very big, imposing, scary, angry.

He was bullied.

He was bigger than everyone else.

The kids would gang up on him.

And Rex was very smart, too.

He’s a smart person.

Very smart.

He liked to shock people.

He was interested in power games.

Rex loved hunting and he loved guns.

Going out, shooting, hunting.

That was his passion.

All petite, all bound in burlap bags.

The burlap on the bodies that’s points right at a hunter.

It was DNA collected from a pizza slice he tossed in a Manhattan trash can that came back as a match with hair found on the victims.

That’s where we obtained, you know, his full profile from from the pizza crust left in the box.

In terms of speaking to my client, the only thing I can tell you that he did say as he was in tears was, “I didn’t do this.

” Everyone’s just trying to put the pieces together.

I want to know what I missed.

I think we all want to know what we missed.

Not far from this quiet stretch of Gilgo Beach on Long Island, New York, investigators uncovered the hidden remains of four young women.

The mystery of who they were and how they got here might have stayed a secret if not for a woman named Shannon Gilbert.

In the early morning hours of May 1st, 2010, 23-year-old Shannon working as an escort called 911.

State police.

Yeah, there’s somebody after me.

The call came from a neighborhood not far from Gilgo Beach.

These people are flying to kill me.

Shannon starts running, knocking on doors.

Where are you, Shannon? She screams and then nothing.

Shannon was gone.

Hello.

Hello.

[Applause] K9 searched the area exhaustively for Shawn and Gilbert.

Dominic Veron was chief of detectives at the Suffach County Police Department.

Months passed without a sign of the missing woman.

And then in December of 2010, near Gilgo Beach, a police officer and his K-9 named Blue found human remains.

Everyone assumed it was Shannon Gilbert.

But it wasn’t Shannon.

Stunned searchers would go on to discover the remains of four other women.

The women were identified as Moren Brainer Barnes, Melissa Bartholomew, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello.

Like Shannon, all were in their 20s.

All were online escorts.

All petite.

Three of the four were wrapped in burlap, the kind you can find in hunting stores.

They became known as the Gilgo 4.

It’s really, really hard cuz I miss her so much.

48 Hours has reported on this case since 2010.

Over the years, we’ve secured exclusive interviews with the family and friends of the Gilgo 4.

Missy K will never forget the wintry day when she got the devastating news.

The detectives came to my house and just said that Moren has been positively identified as one of the victims on the Ocean Parkway.

Her sister, Maren Brainer Barnes, a mother of two, was the first to disappear on July 9th, 2007.

She was very smart and very creative.

She liked being a mom.

She loved being a mom.

But life as a single mom living in Norwich, Connecticut was difficult.

Missy didn’t know it.

But Moren had turned to escort work and that July went to New York City for a weekend to make [Applause] money.

On her way home, she called Missy from Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan.

Attention, please.

I could hear the commotion from the train station.

From the time that she called me, it was poof.

She was gone.

She reported Moren missing.

Eventually, officers would tell Missy that after her sister’s disappearance, someone had used Morin’s cell phone to make a call from Long Island.

It wasn’t known then, but those two locations, Long Island and Midtown Manhattan, would become important clues in the hunt for a serial killer.

Nearly 2 years to the day that Meen vanished, 24year-old Melissa Bartholomew went missing in July of 2009.

Also from Midtown Manhattan.

Lyn Bartholomew is Melissa’s mother.

How often do you think about Melissa? Every single minute of the day.

It just didn’t happen to the girls.

I mean, it destroyed all of our families.

Melissa moved from Buffalo to New York City to work as a hairdresser.

At some point, she also began working as an escort and then disappeared.

About a week after she went missing, Melissa’s then 15-year-old sister, Amanda, started getting calls from Melissa’s phone.

We agreed not to show Amanda’s face.

And she answers, you know, Melissa, where have you been? and this voice is saying, “Oh, this isn’t Melissa.

” Steven Cohen was the family’s lawyer at the time.

He was taunting Amanda and he said, “Do you know what I did to your sister? I killed Melissa.

” All I can say is he’s sick and he’s going to make a mistake and we’re going to catch him.

Those calls from Melissa’s own phone may very well have been that mistake.

When police traced them, the calls placed the person they believed to be Melissa’s killer in Midtown Manhattan.

The following year, Megan Waterman, the mother of a three-year-old girl, disappeared from a hotel on Long Island.

Part of you is like missing or it’s just like something’s always off.

We spoke with Megan’s daughter, Liliana, in 2020.

I would do anything to bring her back, but I can’t and it just like frustrates me so bad.

Megan’s family says the 22-year-old was a creative but troubled young woman who loved fashion and was devoted to her daughter.

What would you say to your mom if you could? I would just want to tell her that like I love her.

I just want her to know like she has a special place in my heart.

No one can ever replace her.

Like the other two women, Megan disappeared in the summer on June 6th, 2010.

She was working as an escort on Long Island.

No matter what her job was, she was a person and she needs justice.

This haunting video from a Holiday in Express is the last time she was seen alive moments before she went to meet a client.

Cell phone records later placed her phone in a Long Island neighborhood called Masipiqua Park.

Amber Costella was the last of the Gilgo fort to disappear.

She lived here just 7 and a half miles from Masipiqua Park.

She used to say she was 411, but she wasn’t.

She was like 4’9, you know? I mean, she was small.

Amber’s friend and former roommate, Dave Showler, spoke with us in 2011.

She was an amazing person.

She really was.

He says Amber was addicted to drugs and used sex work to support her habit.

But as amazing as she was, was as tormented as she was.

After Amber disappeared, police say Shaller told them about her clients.

He described one of them as looking like an ogre and having a first generation Chevrolet Avalanche.

On the night she went missing, Shaller says a client offered Amber $1,500 for the night, six times her hourly rate.

This guy was so relentless.

He called several times.

He was on the phone with her for quite a while.

each time.

He says the client got Amber, an experienced escort, to do something she never did, leave without her purse or cell phone and meet him in his car.

I walked out the front door with her.

She She gave me a hug.

She’s like, “I love you.

” And she left.

It was nearly midnight.

Shaller says that when Amber left this house, she walked down the street and he never saw her again.

Shaller told us that he didn’t see the client’s face that night, but suspects he had seen him before.

So, this is a guy you might have seen.

Yeah, this is somebody that I seen.

I might be the one of the only people who knows who he is.

It would be more than a decade before Shallor’s description would lead to a break in the case and a prime suspect.

The shocking developments in a murder case gone cold.

My coworker called me and she said, “Did you hear what happened to Rex?” And I’m like, “No.

” A husband, a father, an architect stood before a judge charged as a serial killer.

She says it’s Rex.

I said, “No way.

” This house was a main focus and they brought out a lot of evidence.

I just didn’t think it was real.

A Long Island community is still a crime scene tonight.

I even thought to myself, it’s crazy that there’s two Rex Hermans out there.

Mary Shell and Muriel Henriquez worked with Rex Huerman and couldn’t wrap their heads around the news.

We never thought he would be that kind of person.

It’s shocking.

In July of 2023, nearly 13 years after the Gilgo 4 were discovered, Suffach County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison made the announcement.

Authorities believe Rex Huerman is the Long Island serial killer.

Rex Sherman is a demon that walks among us, a predator that ruined families.

The man he calls a demon is a 6’4 architect.

He’s charged with killing Melissa Bartholomew, Megan Waterman, Amber Costello, and is the prime suspect in the death of Moren Brainer Barnes.

What has my client told me? He told me he didn’t do this.

Huerman was living about 20 minutes from Gilgo Beach in Masipa Park, the very same town where Megan’s phone last connected with the cell tower.

And Huerman worked here at his architectural firm in Midtown Manhattan, just blocks from where Moren disappeared, the same area where several of the threatening calls to Melissa’s little sister were made.

The cause of death with regard to the three victims is homicidal violence.

A married man, Huerman, lived in this run-down house and has a daughter and stepson with his second wife, Assa.

Assa, who was born in Iceland, would take the children to see her family there in the summers.

It was during these trips and others, police believe, that Humeman killed the women.

You never got any kind of hint of another life.

No.

two to Muriel Henriquez worked at Huerman’s company RH Consultants and Associates and spoke exclusively to 48 hours.

She says she saw nothing alarming about the Rex Huerman she saw daily.

A little bit of a nerd in a way.

He liked to talk about himself, what he knew.

I mean, not a narcissist, but a little bit of a, you know, I know everything kind of guy.

Pompus.

Pompus.

She remembers him running to and from job sites, eating fast food on the run.

Pizza, that was his number one thing.

Police say they found nearly 300 guns in a basement vault.

When she heard that police had recovered almost 300 firearms from a vault in Huerman’s basement, she was surprised only by the number.

She knew him as an avid hunter.

Going out, shooting, hunting, that was his passion.

What was it about hunting he liked? I don’t know.

I guess he liked the idea of having a prize.

Stalking prey.

Stalking prey and winning.

He liked to win, you know.

And while she says it never occurred to her that Huerman could be dangerous, she does remember a time when his tracking skills unnerved her.

It was her 40th birthday and she had booked a cruise vacation.

Where are you going? I’m going to, you know, I’m going to be in the middle of the ocean.

You’re not going to find me in the middle of the ocean.

He said, “Oh, yes, I can.

” Muriel didn’t think much of the comment until the second day of her trip.

There was a white envelope under my door.

It was a note from him.

The note said, “I told you I could find you anywhere.

” He had photos from hunting trips.

Mary Shell worked with Huerman in the summer of 2010.

It was the same summer that both Amber Costello and Megan Waterman vanished.

He would talk about, you know, the meat in particular that bear meat could keep in the freezer for months.

Hearing authorities now say that some of the victims were wrapped in a burlap that hunters often use was chilling.

The burlap really got to me.

Since Huerman’s arrest, Mary has written about her experience with him.

She’s also talked to other former female employees who said they weren’t always treated with respect.

He would have one of them uh clean the toilet if he thought the cleaning person hadn’t done a good enough job.

A woman in the office.

Yes.

He more than once commented on women’s bodies.

If someone perhaps had gained some weight, you know, that kind of that kind of thing.

John Perezy grew up with Herman.

He says Herman was bullied as a child.

I remember meeting Rex when I was in first and second grade.

He was a loner, not many friends.

The children were super mean to him.

made fun of him and teased him.

But John says he never saw Humman fight back.

He was big enough that if he got upset and started swinging, he would hurt somebody, but he never did.

As Humean got older, John points out things didn’t get much better.

He was rejected by many girls.

We all go through that awkward stage growing up and it seemed like that awkward stage stayed with him longer than usual.

Still, he says many in the community find it hard to believe that Huerman is the notorious serial killer living a double life for more than a decade.

People were saying, “Oh my god, I can’t believe we have a serial killer in our town and we grew up with and we walked amongst the killer.

” Another classmate of humor men’s, actor Billy Baldwin, took to social media when the news broke, tweeting, “It was mindboggling.

” Rex, hello.

How you doing? The awkward Long Island teenager grew up to be a confident and seemingly successful architect.

Antoine Amira met and interviewed him in 2022.

Born and raised on Long Island.

Okay.

Been working in Manhattan since 1987.

There’s nothing in my interview that made me think that this person in front of me uh is a dangerous person.

Anwine is a hotel food and beverage manager in New York who loves real estate.

He has a YouTube interview show where he handpicks guests whom he thinks are interesting and accomplished.

I’m an architect.

I’m an architectural consultant.

I’m a troubleshooter.

Antoine says Huerman was well known for his skill at helping companies and individuals get building permits.

When a job that should have been routine suddenly becomes not routine, Yeah.

I get the phone call.

Gotcha.

Correct.

What really stood out for me was he was very very very smart and known says Antoine for his ability to find loopholes in the rules.

He was pleased when he was doing it that he could that he that he could outwit the the system.

That’s it folks.

That was Rex.

But Antoine says he remembers it was hard to get Huerman to crack a smile.

It’s selfie time.

Selfie time.

Not even during the signature sunglasses selfies he takes with every guest.

Two.

Three.

Can you smile? That is If police are right, Rex Yur was able to hide a life as a serial killer.

And if he did, his habit of eating pizza on the go would turn out to be his undoing.

[Applause] For more than a decade after the discovery of the Gilgo 4, Rex Humeman’s name never appeared on a suspect list until a new task force was formed with Suffach County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison and Suffach County DA Ray Tyranny.

In February of 2022, we formed the task force and then a mere 6 weeks later, Rex Herman was identified for the first time.

A suspect in six weeks.

So, how did they do it? It turns out that buried in the original case files were a number of critical clues that the new task force was finally able to connect.

Remember Amber’s roommate, Dave Shaller? She’s like, “I love you.

” You know, she gave me a hug and she left.

He had told police about one of Amber’s clients and his vehicle, just a large built man and that he was driving this this first generation Chevy Avalanche.

A first generation Chevy Avalanche with a description of an ogre-like man and the make and model of his truck.

Police took a closer look at Amber’s phone records from 2010.

Shaller had told them that before Amber disappeared, there was one particular client calling incessantly.

He called several times.

He was on the phone with her for quite a while each time.

Police back then knew the client was using a burner phone.

That’s a prepaid phone that anyone can buy and use anonymously.

and they knew that Moren, Melissa, and Megan had all been in contact with burner numbers right before they disappeared.

In 2012, with the help of the FBI, they determined that most of those calls connected to cell towers inside a small area of Masipiqua Park.

They called it the box.

So, how large an area is that box? It’s, you know, a couple of blocks within within Masipua Park.

The new task force began the search for a large built man who also lived in that small area and owned a Chevy Avalanche at the time of the disappearances.

Was there a aha moment when all of a sudden his name came up? Once we were able to attach the avalanche inside of that massipa box which then attached to Rex Herman, that was a moment where we said, “Okay, there’s something here.

” The task force now had a prime suspect.

And when they looked at Humeman’s personal cell phone records, they found that his phone was in the same area as those burner phones when they were used to contact a victim in Masipiqua Park or in Midtown Manhattan.

It was always consistent.

Tyranny says this was also true for those awful calls Melissa’s family got from that man using her phone back in 2009.

He said, “Do you know what I did to your sister?” And he said, “Well, I killed Melissa.

” The task force says that it confirmed that Huerman does in fact use burner phones.

Investigators say he had two different burner numbers in 2022.

and they say they watched and put money on one of those accounts here.

And according to court papers, the team also documented three email accounts using fake names, including John Springfield, Thomas Hawk, and Hunter 1903.

And all linked to those burner numbers.

And prosecutors say that Huerman was using a burner phone to send these selfies to solicit and arrange for sexual activity.

One of those accounts linked to Huerman, prosecutors wrote, was used to conduct quote thousands of searches related to sex workers, sadistic torture related pornography, and child pornography.

There was a lot of uh torture, uh porn, and depictions of women uh being abused, uh being raped, and being killed.

Investigators also say that while they were busy watching Humen, Huerman was trying to watch them, conducting searches on the task force and the Gilgo victims.

not only pictures of the victims, pictures of their relatives, their their their sisters, their children.

Uh and he was trying to locate those individuals.

The circumstantial evidence was building, but investigators also had physical evidence from the Gilgo 4, including one male hair that was found in the burlap used to quote restrain and transport Megan Waterman’s body.

and they wanted to see if they could link it to Huerman.

Police tailed Huerman and when he threw out this pizza box in this trash can here in Midtown Manhattan, they pounced the pizza, which was, you know, obviously very significant.

Tierney says that Huerman’s DNA that was found on that pizza crust was consistent with a DNA profile from the hair found with Megan Waterman’s body.

And that DNA profile is only found in 0.

04% of the population.

That was a remarkable day.

It was, you know, the weekend and, you know, you read, you get the report and you read it and then you read it again and then you read it a third time and then you read it a fourth time.

Uh, and then you start making calls.

With the DNA, the search histories, and the burner phone evidence, the team felt it was time.

When we decided to take down the case, we, you know, it was a sudden decision.

We did see him contacting a number of sex workers using a burner phone, which obviously is concerning.

Playing clothes, officers arrested him around the corner from his office.

I don’t think he had any clue.

I don’t think he had any clue that we were going to him.

Police spent 12 days looking through Herman’s home, pulling those guns out of the basement and digging in the backyard.

They say it will take some time to comb through what they have now.

And they were tight lipped about what they found.

Has the search been fruitful? Great question.

And the answer is yes.

Can you elaborate on fruitful? You said yes, it’s fruitful.

There have been items that we have taken into our possession.

That makes it fruitful.

And one more big piece of evidence taken into possession.

A first generation Chevy Avalanche Herman once used and it was sitting on property he owns in South Carolina when they recovered it.

We were able to seize that Chevy Avalanche pursuant to a search warrant and we’re certainly going to analyze that.

But there were female hairs found on some of the victim’s bodies that don’t belong to the victims.

So who do they belong to? After Rex Herman’s arrest, his quiet neighborhood in Masipeka Park was overrun by investigators and media, focusing intense scrutiny on the ramshackle home and its remaining residents, his stepson Christopher Sheridan, daughter Victoria Herman, and his wife of more than 25 years, Assa.

Ellerup.

Their life going forward is always going to be the wife or the children of suspected serial killer.

That’s what it’s going to be from now on.

Attorney Bob Macedonio represents Assa Erup who has since filed for divorce from Hurman.

He says she was as stunned as anyone by the accusations.

She had no idea any of this was going on.

The allegations are shocking.

Nobody wants to think that they’ve been living with sleeping next to a serial killer for the past 25 years.

As it turns out, Assa may have inadvertently helped focus the investigation on her husband.

Investigators say they’ve identified strands of female hair that were found on two of the victims.

One hair on Waterman comes back to his wife or the DNA profiles are consistent and then the DNA profile from Costello is consistent with the wife.

Although prosecutors have evidence that Osa was out of town when those murders occurred, they will have to explain how those hairs got on the victims.

Suffach County DA Ray Tierney says it could be as simple as transfer.

You live at home with a spouse.

A little bit of your hair falls on your shoulder as well as as your spouse’s.

Then you go out and you interact with a third party and that hair gets on them.

Assa Erup has not been charged or named a suspect in any of the murders.

You don’t believe that Rex Humeman’s wife was involved in this in any way? There’s no evidence to indicate that? No.

Along with the public scrutiny of Assa, there’s also been support from people that perhaps know all too well what she’s going through.

Carrie Rosson, the daughter of serial killer Dennis Rder, who named himself BTK, tweeted, “Asa and her kids are also victims.

I can tell that they are going through hell.

” And from Melissa Moore, the daughter of Keith Jesperson, a serial killer known as the Happy Face Killer, for taunting authorities with letters signed with a happy face.

She reached out immediately to myself and we put her in contact with Assa.

At a press conference, Macedonia announced more set up a GoFundMe page for Assa, which raised over $50,000.

Money he says will largely go to medical bills.

Assa is battling breast and skin cancer.

And because Rex Huerman was a sole provider for the family, Macedonio says she will soon lose her health insurance.

Assa would like me to express her thanks for the support she’s received.

Um, she’s going through a very difficult time.

Assa’s children have also paid a heavy price.

Her daughter Victoria, who worked for her father at the architectural consulting firm, and her son Christopher are both now unemployed.

Assa struggles to support them, says Macedonio, while she’s also trying to figure out how to start over.

How is she getting through every day? Honestly, yeah.

Minute by minute, she has no one else to turn to.

At this time, family and friends have been hesitant to have her come over because they don’t want the media attention.

She gets followed wherever she goes.

For the moment, she and her children continue to live in the house in Masipiqua Park, which the family says was excessively damaged during the police search seen in these photos provided by Osa’s attorney.

It’s a daily reminder of the unimaginable crimes her estranged husband is charged with and the investigation that continues into what else he may have done.

Rex Huerman awaiting trial is locked inside a Suffach County jail in a 60s square foot cell.

He denies killing Melissa Bartholomew, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello.

Their voices now silent as the sand where they have been ruthlessly discarded.

How sure are you as you’re sitting here now that Rexerman is the Long Island serial killer? So, we’re just at the beginning stages of this case, but we would not have brought this indictment if we weren’t confident in our case.

He took away somebody’s mother, somebody’s daughter, somebody’s sister, and not just one person, multiple individuals.

Huerman is currently the prime suspect for the murder of Moren Brainer Barnes.

And for investigators, an obvious question still hangs heavy.

If Huerman is a killer, are there other victims? I mean, isn’t there a real concern that there may be other victims out there? Always.

Who’s to say that there’s not more bodies out there that we need to investigate? In 2011, police did find other bodies along Ocean Parkway.

After finding the Gilgo 4, there is victim number five, Jessica Taylor, an escort who went missing in 2003.

Another set of remains police called Jane do number six is now identified as Valerie Mack, also working as an escort.

Number seven, to investigators surprise, they found a toddler girl.

Number eight, an Asian male dressed in women’s clothing.

Number nine, a female skull belonging to Karen Vada, an escort who disappeared in 1996.

Number 10, female remains from a victim cops nicknamed Peaches because of a tattoo on her torso.

Although her remains were found six miles away, police say DNA confirms Peaches is the mother of that toddler.

None of those victims has been linked to Huermen.

Is it that you can’t connect him yet or you believe he probably isn’t the person who killed these other other individuals? I don’t know.

Investigations also spread to Las Vegas in South Carolina where Huerman owns property with detectives there taking a fresh look at cases of missing women.

And then there’s Nikki Brass.

I remembered him because one, he’s massive and how many massive like 6’5 architects work in Manhattan, live in Masipa.

You’re going from brown and blonde.

Now a hairdresser, Nikki claims she may be one that got away.

She told us she used to work as an escort.

And while we cannot substantiate her story, Nikki claims she can’t shake her memory of the night she says she was solicited for sex by Rex Herman and says she fled the restaurant where they met.

I had never gone anywhere and like felt fear.

My gut was telling me I needed to get away and I’ve never had that before.

Nikki says what she found most disturbing is that Huerman himself brought up those bodies bound in burlap by Gilgo Beach.

He wanted to like really get into it.

Like he asked me how I thought they could get rid of the bodies without being caught in that area.

And I said, “I’ve never been over there.

I’ve never even seen Gilgo Beach.

” And his response was, “Well, it’s really dark and desolate.

I’m John Ray and I’m the lawyer.

Nikki is now represented by John Ray, an attorney who is also representing Shannon Gilbert’s family.

In December of 2011, investigators finally found Shannon here in the marsh, not far from Gilgo Beach.

But they don’t believe she was murdered.

It’s an unfortunate incident, but right now we believe that she just ran into the marsh and unfortunately drowned.

A former investigator told us that he believes Shannon was high on drugs that night and says her death was an accident, something John Ray just can’t believe.

While he doesn’t think Shannon was a victim of humor, he does believe she was murdered and points to that 911 call.

It absolutely makes no sense that she’s found where she is except that someone else put her there or killed her there.

While questions remain about Shannon’s last hours, there’s no question she’s the reason so many families may finally be getting answers they have long waited for.

We spoke to her sister Sheree in 2011.

If my sister, you know, didn’t make that 911 call, I don’t think that these other women would have been recovered either.

Now, investigators hope that with an arrest, they can give the victim’s families who stood with them a sense of justice and of peace.

I’ve gotten to know the families and I’m inspired by them and I’m impressed by their patience.

A local legend has it that this place, Gilgo Beach, was named for a skilled fisherman called Gil.

These silver gray waters, once his secret hunting ground.

Today, this beach area is better known for a relentless hunter of human prey, a serial killer whose chilling presence can still be felt in the ocean air.

a 35year-old case.

His father was indicted for killing his mother.

Whoever did this hated this woman.

Their entire case is circumstantial.

But can he find the truth? I want to know what happened.

48 hours is all new.

CBS next in streaming on Paramount Plus.

I think Forest wanted to become a legend and I actually think he succeeded.

He was described as a modern-day Indiana Jones.

Forest came up with the idea to hide a bronze chest filled with gold somewhere in the Rocky Mountains.

I bought this beautiful little treasure chest and I started filling it up with wonderful things.

There’s 265 gold coins, hundreds and hundreds of gold nuggets.

He wrote a 24line poem guiding people to the location of the treasure.

Yeah, that’s exactly it.

He created effectively a treasure map in the form of that poem.

I’m going to read the poem.

So, here it goes.

As I have gone alone in there and with my treasures bold, I can keep my secret wear and hint of riches new and old.

There’ll be no paddle up your creek, just heavy loads and water high.

So hear me all and listen good.

Your effort will be worth the cold.

If you’ve been brave and in the wood, I give you title to the gold.

And I read that poem and oh god, it was like a hook.

No place for the meek.

The bug got in me and I couldn’t let it go.

I tried to climb up into that cave there.

I couldn’t sleep.

I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever heard.

How much was that treasure worth? I I think that 1 million is a pretty good mark to use.

I made at least 85 trips.

I didn’t find the treasure yet.

We had so much fun.

It was crazy.

Since there’s a mountain lion in the area, we don’t want to take any chances.

So, we’re bringing our gun.

I have spent over 2,000 hours.

This is where I ran into my rattlesnake.

Searching for forest fence treasure.

Well, I made it hard deliberately.

If it was easy, anyone could do it.

For at least five people, the search for Fen’s treasure was the last thing they ever did.

Yes.

Unfortunately, you know, this treasure hunt did claim at least five lives.

Randy Bill was the first.

Paris Wallace also died in the Rio Grand River.

Eric Ashby died in the Arkansas River.

There was a gentleman who was hiking in Yellowstone and ended up falling off of a cliff.

Two men who went out with snowmobiles.

I’ve got him in sight still.

One of them froze to death and the other one was hospitalized.

Of course, Finn was a bad person.

He could have stopped this madness before it became what it became.

It wasn’t worth it.

How does Forest Fen respond to that? By to some degree digging in his heels.

He didn’t like the idea that anyone would tell him to bring his hunt to an end because of a few deaths.

And he said that if somebody was murdered because of the hunt, that would probably be too much.

High at top a ridge near Dinosaur National Monument, 53-year-old Mike Sexon froze to death.

This is the last known photo of him taken in March 2020 as he hiked in that remote area.

Days later, Mike’s body was airlifted off the mountaintop.

Okay, he’s coming up.

All right, he’s about halfway.

Mike became the fifth person to die while searching for Forest Fen’s hidden treasure.

Mike was full of life.

Mike was an adventurer and always smiling, always laughing, a big deep chuckle.

Friend Liz Keyi struggles to reconcile Mike’s love of adventure with his terrible loss.

I’m glad that he took this adventure.

I am very sad that he’s gone.

I miss Mike every day.

I miss his hugs when I’m stressed.

I miss his support.

I miss his voice, his laughter.

Beth Van Oz today is forced to cope without her longtime boyfriend.

Mike had been her rock after she suffered a brain injury.

He was more than just my partner.

He was in some ways my caretaker.

After Mike’s death, Liz felt compelled to send Forest Fen an anguished email.

How many people have to die before your game is done? I had received an email back and and he just gave his condolences to Beth.

First, Fen was a very complicated person.

Dan Barbaresi explores Fen’s complexities in his new book, Chasing the Thrill, Obsession, Death, and Glory in America’s Most Extraordinary Treasure Hunt.

He believed in stories that were bigger than just your run-of-the-mill standard tale.

And he dreamed big.

He believed in big things.

And Fen had lived a big life, beginning with his days in the Air Force when he was shot down twice in Vietnam and later as the owner of a well-known southwestern art gallery.

How did a retired fighter pilot reinvent himself in Santa Fe, New Mexico with not just an art gallery, but one of the most famous art galleries in America? I think he would tell you it’s about the show you can put on.

And there’s no question that Fen put on a good show.

His gallery attracted celebrities like Jacqueline Kennedy Onasses, Steve Martin, and Ralph Lauren.

But there were recurring whispers that Fen may have built his impressive collection by plundering ancient Native American PBLO.

There were certainly some questions about how he came in possession of some of those artifacts over time.

In 2009, long after Fen had sold his gallery, his home was raided by federal agents from the Bureau of Land Management.

And it ultimately turned out that Fen was not charged with anything in that case.

The next year, Fen self-published his memoir, The Thrill of the Chase.

To get families into the great outdoors, Fen put a little incentive inside his memoir, that distinctive 24line poem.

He claimed it contained clues that would lead one clever person to the 10 by 10 inch chest of gold he’d hidden somewhere in the Rocky Mountains.

If you can follow the clues in the poem to the treasure chest, you’re going to be amazed at what you find.

Then launched a modern-day treasure hunt, but it was slowgoing at first.

It felt like a small little treasure hunt for a few people who knew about it.

When did that change and why? It got noticed by the larger media.

There were a few big pieces.

One in Hemispheres magazine, one in Newsweek.

I think the name of that reporter was the same as my name.

Whatever it was was a very hard name to pronounce, but I’m pretty sure it was Tony.

That much I’ve got.

It’s pronounced Dopal, by the way.

It really started to raise the profile of it in a significant way.

It wasn’t long before tens of thousands of people were on the hunt.

In 2015, months before any of the searchers died, Ben spoke to CBS News about the likelihood of anyone finding his treasure.

It isn’t impossible, but you’re not going to stumble over it.

You have to deliberately go to it.

Fen said the spot he chose was so beautiful he could imagine it as his final resting place.

An original version of the poem actually talked about his bones being there next to the treasure chest itself.

Fen dropped that idea.

The searchers had their own reasons for going on the hunt and it became clear that many were seeking more than a box of gold.

I think a lot of people really wanted to be part of something bigger than themselves.

Maybe there was something missing in their lives and for others it was that they felt that people hadn’t believed in them to the extent that they should have.

Searchers shared their passion and began to compare so-called solves, their interpretation of the clues in the poem.

It was all online until some got the idea to meet in real life.

And so of that was born Fenbury.

Exactly what it sounds like.

It’s a Forest Fen Jamboree.

Each summer, Fen’s fans flocked to Santa Fe where Forest Fen was her star attraction.

The guy described it as as meeting a beetle.

You know, it was that kind of thing.

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