The son of a Gilgo Beach murder victim has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against suspected serial killer Rex Heuerman, his wife and his daughter — just days before he pleaded guilty to brutally killing seven women.
The wrongful death lawsuit filed Monday by attorney John Ray on behalf of Benjamin Torres, the only child of murder victim Valerie Mack, marks the first known lawsuit filed by a family member of a Gilgo victim against the 62-year-old accused killer of Massapequa Park. Newsday reported.
The suit alleged that Torres’ loss of his mother — whom Heuerman allegedly killed sometime between Sept. 1, 2000, and Nov. 19, 2000 — deprived him of her care and protection, according to the filing in state Superior Court in Suffolk County. Obtained by correction.
Mack disappeared when Torres was just 6 years old. She was allegedly “brutally tortured” and dismembered by Heuerman, the lawsuit said.
The mother was working as an escort in Philadelphia under the name Melissa Taylor when she disappeared at the age of twenty-four. Her remains were discovered near a drainage basin on Nov. 19, 2000, in a densely wooded area in Manorville, Newsday reported.
Her case — as well as those of several other sex workers whose bodies were found on Gilgo Beach — went cold for several decades until investigators finally made a break and arrested Heuerman in July 2023.
The document added that Torres seeks “compensation for the torture and unlawful killing of Valerie Mack, for the terror, restraint, pain, mutilation and dismemberment inflicted upon her before and after death, for the concealment and mutilation of her remains, and for the profound and prolonged harm inflicted upon her.”
The lawsuit also seeks compensation for profits that Heuerman’s ex-wife, Asa Ellerup, and his daughter, Victoria Heuerman, may have made from the Peacock documentary “Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets,” which was released in June.
Newsday reported that Herman’s family was paid more than $1 million in exchange for allowing the documentary crew exclusive access to their home and life.
Ellerup was never accused of involvement in Heuerman’s crimes, and authorities said the murders occurred when his family was not home — but Torres’ lawsuit made the bombshell claim that the wife and daughter were complicit in Mack’s death.
“Asa Ellerup and Victoria Heuerman at some point knew, concealed, intentionally ignored or intentionally avoided knowing material facts relating to the assault, murder, dismemberment, concealment and disposition of Valerie Mack,” the lawsuit alleged, according to Newsday.
Robert Macedonio, an attorney for Ellerup and Victoria Heuerman, told Patch that the lawsuit “is a reckless attempt by John Ray to keep himself connected to a case in which his only client, Shanann Gilbert, was not involved in the Gilgo Beach murders.”
Macedonia added: “I am confident that this matter will be dismissed. I repeat: Asa Ellerup and Victoria Heuerman have no involvement or knowledge of the crimes for which Rex Heuerman has been accused.”
The lawsuit also alleged that the usual two-year deadline for filing wrongful death claims in New York after a person’s death should be waived for Torres, given his age at the time of his mother’s death and the delay in identifying her due to her brutal dismemberment, which obscured many factors identifying her.
Macedonia, Wray and Heuerman’s attorney, Michael J. Brown, did not immediately respond to The Washington Post’s requests for comment late Monday.
Sources previously told The Post that Brown and Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney are reaching a plea deal for Herman to handle the seven murders at his arraignment Wednesday in Suffolk District Court.
The exact charges to which Heuerman will plead guilty, and other details of the deal, were not immediately clear.
Tierney Heuerman has been linked to the killings of Mack, Jessica Taylor, 20, Megan Waterman, 22, Melissa Barthelemy, 24, Maureen Brainard Barnes, 25, Amber Lynn Costello, 27, and Sandra Costella, 28.