BODY COUNT 11 (1 child) on Long Island beaches NY (6 ID'd)
Nut44x4:
Cops: Deaths could be work of serial killer
Updated: December 14, 2010 12:06 PM
Police are investigating whether the deaths of four people whose remains were found along a stretch of beach in Babylon came at the hands of a serial killer, the Suffolk police commissioner said Tuesday.
The bodies - three of which were discovered in thick underbrush Monday, two days after another set of skeletal remains was found nearby - were tossed from a vehicle possibly as long as a year and a half to two years ago, Suffolk Police Commissioner Richard Dormer said at a news conference Tuesday at the frigid, windswept scene near Ocean Parkway.
Asked if there was a serial killer dumping bodies, Dormer said, "We're looking at that - that we could have a serial killer."
PHOTOS: Police investigation off Ocean Parkway | LI's most notorious crimes through the years
VIDEO: More bodies found
Two of the bodies are female, Dormer said. He asked that anyone with information on suspicious cars in the area call the county's CrimeStoppers line, 800-220-TIPS.
Dormer said police are not sure if one of the bodies is that of missing Jersey City, N.J., woman Shonnan Gilbert, 24, whom police have said was a prostitute.
Dormer said Gilbert was known to have been traveling to Fire Island to meet a client before she disappeared in May.
Police will be interviewing Gilbert's alleged pimp and client from that day, Dormer said. He would not identify them or give other details.Also, a Maine detective said Tuesday he is waiting to hear from Suffolk authorities on whether one of the bodies is related to his missing persons case.
Det. Donald Blatchford of the Scarborough, Maine, police said he had talked with Suffolk police Monday and was expecting to hear if one of the bodies was that of Scarborough resident Megan Waterman, 22, who was last seen at a Holiday Inn Express in Hauppauge on June 6.
Dormer said police have no suspects in the case.
The area where the bodies were found "is close enough to be of interest," Blatchford said.
Blatchford said he has been in regular contact with Suffolk authorities since Waterman disappeared. She and her boyfriend had traveled from Scarborough to Long Island after placing an ad for an escort on Craigslist.
Blatchford said Suffolk police already have DNA evidence in the Waterman case from belongings left behind in the Hauppauge hotel.
Blatchford said he hasn't received any indication from Suffolk police that Waterman may be among the victims found on the beach.
Blatchford said he has made some progress recently in the case, but could not elaborate without compromising the case.
On Monday night, Det. Lt. Gerard Pelkofsky of Suffolk's Homicide Squad said a missing-person report had been made in May for Gilbert, who he said worked as a prostitute. He said she met a client on Craigslist and arranged a meeting on Fire Island, he said. She traveled with another man there to meet the client, where she was last seen on May 1, he said.
A Jersey City police source, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed a missing-person report was filed for Gilbert and said detectives had done "extensive work" on the file.
"They're in contact with Long Island police right now," the source said Monday night, declining to elaborate.
Neighbors at Gilbert's modest apartment building on Christopher Columbus Drive in Jersey City said Tuesday morning they didn't know her.
Jose Delarosa, who lives on the fourth floor, said Tuesday he sometimes could hear Gilbert quarreling with her boyfriend, but "never anything bad."
Ruby Aparicio, who lives on the first floor, said she'd seen Gilbert a couple times around the building, but they had never spoken. Her third-floor apartment is now occupied by a family that said they moved in three months ago and had never met her.
A Jersey City police spokesman, Lt. Edgar Martinez, did not respond to messages Monday night.
Pelkofsky acknowledged the strong possibility that the four people are homicide victims dumped there by the same person or people.
"Common sense tells us it's not a coincidence," he said.
All four bodies were found within a quarter-mile of one another on the north side of the parkway.
The first set of remains were discovered Saturday by a canine unit searching in the area on a missing-persons case as well as for training purposes.
The remains in the underbrush, were about 6 or 8 feet from the road's shoulder.
Detectives and other police officers Monday searched a stretch of more than a mile through the day on both sides of the parkway and a median, and officers and a cadaver dog found a second decomposed body about 500 feet from the initial body, also in heavy underbrush near the roadway. Two others were found a short distance away.
The area is near a strip of Ocean Parkway with beachfront facing the Atlantic on one side, and marshlands, thick brush and a chain of small islands on the bay side between South Oyster Bay and the Robert Moses Causeway.
Two of the three bodies found Monday were wrapped in burlap, a source familiar with the investigation said.
The skeletal remains all appear to have been there at least a month, but "some appear to be have been there longer than others," Pelkofsky said. The badly decomposed state of the remains means all will need to be identified through dental records or DNA.
A cadaver dog will search the beach Tuesday, Dormer said.
Identifying the bodies could take weeks because of their conditions, Dormer said. No paper identification, such as drivers licenses, has been found, he said.
The New York City medical examiner as well as the Suffolk medical examiner are working to identify the bodies, Dormer said.
A special meeting was scheduled for Tuesday with Suffolk detectives, the district attorney's office, a member of the county crime lab team and a representative of the county medical examiner's office to go over what has been found so far and to put together a plan for identifying the bodies.
http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/cops-deaths-could-be-work-of-serial-killer-1.2540757?qr=1
Edit to change body count in subject line from 10 to 11 and ID'd from 5 to 6. MB
Nut44x4:
December 14th, 2010 1:28 pm ET
Bodies found on NY beach may link to murders of Atlantic City prostitutes
An apparent serial killer left four bodies “displayed” in marshes along Gilgo Beach on Long Island. The homicides are eerily reminiscent of the murders of four Atlantic City Prostitutes in Nov., 2006.
The first body in N.Y., was discovered Saturday by a Suffolk County K-9 officer and his dog “Blue.” The pair were on a training exercise and looking for a missing person along the beach on Oak Island, which is adjacent to Gilgo Beach.
The subsequent investigation on Sunday and Monday turned up the skeletal remains of three more people. The search for more bodies is being conducted today.
Yellow crime flags are planted in the area where the bodies and body parts were discovered along Ocean Parkway on the remote beach just south of Fire Island.
The murders appear to have occurred at different times during November according to the degrees of decomposition, police said. More accurate information will be available after the medical examiner completes his investigation.
November is the same month the murders of four Atlantic City Prostitutes occurred four years ago. The killer of Kim Raffo, Tracy Ann Roberts, Barbara Breidor and Molly Dilts was never found.
The two most notable clues given to the public in the Atlantic City case was the fact that the women were found without their shoes, leading investigators and the public to wonder if the killer had a shoe fetish or took them as a trophy.
The other clue was that the killer may have been driving a pale green van. Others described a pale white or yellow van.
Although the bodies on Gilgo Beach have not yet been identified, one woman from Jersey City, N.J., has been missing since May 1, 2010 and grabbed the attention of investigators.
Alleged prostitute Shonnan Gilbert, 24, advertised on Craig’s List and was driven to Fire Island by a male companion to meet an alleged client, according to police.
Gilbert was never seen or heard from again. She was reported missing on May 1, 2010.
The Jersey City and Suffolk County Police are now working together to determine if Gilbert is among the dead, according to the Suffolk County Police.
The news of the bodies on Long Island slowly trickled down to southern New Jersey Tuesday morning. Officers from the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Task Force are now seeking information from the Suffolk County Police.
Information may shed light on the Atlantic City murder case, which has grown cold over the last four years. Only one man grabbed the attention of the public and police at the time of the murders. He was never charged with the crime or even named a suspect.
Terry Oleson was a handyman who worked at the Golden Key Motel in 2006. The bodies were found displayed behind the motel. Oleson was subsequently arrested and charged with invasion of privacy for secretly filming the minor child of girlfriend after a search warrant of his home yielded the video.
Many people in the community assumed he was the murderer after a prostitute claimed she knew him and that he boasted of killing people. The woman later recanted her statement and said she misidentified Oleson after seeing another man on the street, who she claimed committed the murders.
Oleson’s attorney James Leonard said in a phone interview Tuesday that he knew his client has never traveled to Long Island. He said if the murders are connected it will finally clear his client’s name.
“This is good news for us,” said Leonard. “I know Mr. Olsen’s whereabouts and he has never been near New York.
Leonard said his client is not a well traveled person.
People who are missing loved ones are now waiting for the identification of the victims found on the beach. The process will be slow and painstaking due to the state of the remains. Dental records and DNA will be needed for positive identification, according to police.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates throughout the day.
http://www.examiner.com/city-hall-in-atlantic-city/bodies-found-on-ny-beach-may-link-to-murders-of-atlantic-city-prostitutes
trimmonthelake:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101214/ap_on_re_us/us_beach_human_remains
With 4 bodies, NY cops eye possible serial killer
1 hr 1 min ago
BABYLON, N.Y. – A serial killer may have abandoned four bodies, each apparently dumped from a vehicle, along a desolate, wind-swept stretch of highway not far from Long Island's Jones Beach, police said Tuesday.
Police found the badly decomposed remains, feet from the roadway, near Cedar Beach as they searched for a missing prostitute last known to be headed to Fire Island, said Suffolk County Police Commissioner Richard Dormer. At least two of the bodies are female, but authorities haven't determined the gender of the other two, Dormer said.
Investigators were taking DNA samples and examining dental records to try to identify them.
"We're looking at that — that we could have a serial killer," Dormer said in response to a reporter's question.
The beach is about three miles from where the missing woman was headed when she disappeared May 1, but Dormer said there was no indication yet that hers was one of the four bodies.
Dormer said the four appeared to have been killed elsewhere and then brought to the site, a strip of land less than 1,000 yards wide that divides the Great South Bay from the Atlantic Ocean. The roadway connects the landmark Jones Beach State Park with several state and town-run beaches to its east, including Cedar Beach.
The remains were badly decomposed, but appeared to have been dumped over an 18-month period, Dormer said. The first set of remains were found Saturday as police were following up on a missing-person report. The three other bodies were found Monday.
Jersey City, N.J., police identified the missing prostitute as 24-year-old Shannon Gilbert, of Jersey City. Dormer said Gilbert worked as a prostitute and arranged through Craigslist to meet a client on Fire Island.
The popular summertime vacation resort of Fire Island is actually a 30-mile strip of villages located just east of Cedar Beach. While some parts of western Fire Island are accessible by motor vehicle, most visitors travel there by ferry.
Police officers returned to the scene Tuesday with a cadaver dog, searching the area for additional bodies. Despite a howling wind, temperatures in the low 20s and a coating of snow on the ground, Dormer said the dog would still be able to do its work. He said the search of the vast, remote area could take days or longer.
The discovery drew comparisons to a 4-year-old New Jersey case in which four prostitutes' bodies were found in a drainage ditch in Egg Harbor Township, just outside Atlantic City and about a mile from the beach. Those killings remain unsolved.
Atlantic County Prosecutor Theodore Housel said Tuesday that Atlantic County detectives were still investigating the bodies found in November 2006 and had spoken with authorities in New York about their case.
"We have been in contact with authorities in Suffolk County, New York," he said. "It would not be fair for us to comment on their investigation." He would not comment further.
Nut44x4:
http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpps/news/suspected-long-island-serial-killer-may-have-met-victims-on-craigslist-dpgonc-20101215-fc_11086549
That link locks me up, but it says they may know who the killer is.
Nut44x4:
http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/location-of-four-bodies-found-1.2541830
good map
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