Daughter of Gilgo Beach suspect accepts some of his alleged sex behavior, saying, ‘I'm not a kink shamer' — while revealing if she thinks he's serial killer
'You know, everybody is into what they're into,' Victoria Heuermann, 28, told the new Peacock docu-series, 'The Gilgo Beach Killer: House of Secrets' — her first interview since her dad, a married father of two, was arrested nearly two years ago after allegedly sexually torturing sex workers and murdering seven of them on Long Island.
'At this point, like, after everything that has happened, I'm like, I'm not somebody to say, 'Hey, you shouldn't be into this,' or, 'You should,' ' Victoria told the show, which begins airing Tuesday.
7 Victoria Heuermann, 28, here with mother Asa Ellerup, says in a new docu-series she is 'on the fence' about whether her father Rex is the Gilgo Beach serial killer.
Peacock
'I'm not a kink shamer,' she said.
The accusations against her dad have included sexual attacks, and among the items reportedly found at the family's home after his arrest were a fair-haired, child-sized doll, an unnerving portrait of a blonde woman with blackened eyes and 'a lot of torture porn.'
When asked if she thinks her 61-year-old architect dad is guilty of the murders, the daughter added, 'Whether or not I believe my dad did it or not, I'm on the fence about that.
'Half of me believes he didn't do it, but at the same time, he could have totally had a double life.'
The self-proclaimed comic-book nut and gamer suggested she initially thought he might be guilty.
7 Ellerup and Victoria leave Suffolk County court after a hearing for Rex.
Dennis A. Clark
'In the beginning, when this all first went down, I didn't know what to believe, whether he did it or not,' she said. 'But as the weeks progressed, a lot of it was coming back to me.
'I was in school, my dad came to every performance. I was in the school band. He came to every performance, every dance recital, and my mom picked him up every day from the train station. I would see him in the morning when he was going to work and I was going to school.
'And as I'm thinking about it, I'm like, I really don't know.
7 Rex Heuermann is accused sexually torturing women and killing seven sex workers.
Rex Heuermann Consultants & Associates
'If he was guilty, it's gonna start to become like a love-hate relationship,' she said. 'This is my dad, and I love him as my dad. The hate is this other side of him that came out. … Both feelings, love and hate, can co-exist.'
The show said that a week before the series was set to air, Victoria then amended her hedging on her father's potential guilt to say she now believes he is 'most likely' guilty.
7 Rex's alleged 'Gilgo Four' victims were (clockwise from top left): Maureen Brainard-Barnes, Melissa Barthelemy, Amber Lynn Costello and Megan Waterman.
Suffolk County Police Department
7 Three more slain women — (from left) Sandra Costilla, Jessica Taylor and Valerie Mack — have been tied to Rex, too.
Suffolk County Police Department
The daughter, who was brought up in the family's Massapequa Park home, said the high-profile case has forced her to shy away from the public.
'I didn't start going out with my friends again until probably early September because we were at one point being followed around,' she said. 'Right now, I'm just safe here in this house. I kind of hide in my room a lot. … It's all open season on my family now.'
Rex Heuermann was arrested July 13, 2023, outside his Midtown Manhattan office and charged with three cold-case murders of young sex workers — the first of what would be a tally of alleged victims that has since grown to seven.
The suspect — whose daughter described him as a 'true-crime fan' — is now awaiting trial in the sensational case.
7 Ellerup and her son, Christopher, sit on their front porch after police raided their Massapequa Park home.
Dennis A. Clark
According to Rex's wife, Asa Ellerup, Victoria was conceived on the night she and her husband were married in Sweden in 1995 after a years-long friendship dating to their teen years.
Their daughter, who has an older half-brother, Christopher, from Ellerup's first marriage, said she had a happy upbringing, which included trips to Disney World and Comic Con conventions in several states.
'I may have considered changing my name when this first all went down,' Victoria said. 'But as time passed and progressed and I've been coping with this,' she said she chose not to.
7 Ellerup wholeheartedly believes cops have the wrong guy, while their daughter isn't so sure.
Peacock
Her worst moments, she said, were when the FBI and local cops raided the family's home in 2023, just hours after Rex was taken into custody in Manhattan.
The family was kicked out of its house for what would be the first of two extensive searches in a hunt for evidence to the grisly crimes.
When the family returned, Victoria noted, her 'Magic the Gathering' cards and brand-new PlayStation 5 were gone and the house was so disheveled that it took time to find a place to sit down.
'I feel when I came home and seeing everything they took, I feel like as if they were trying to leave us for dead,' she said. 'It's almost as if they think that we're guilty of this as well.'
Additional reporting by David DeTurris
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