RIVERHEAD, N.Y. -- Gilgo Beach murders suspect Rex Heuermann is scheduled to appear in court on Long Island today, where he is expected to face charges in a fourth murder.
Heuermann was taken into custody last summer and accused of killing three women - Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello - whose bodies were discovered along Gilgo Beach in 2010.
Authorities have previously identified him as the primary suspect in the murder of a fourth woman, Maureen Brainard-Barnes.
The 60-year-old pleaded not guilty and has been held without bail since his arrest.
- Read More: Rex Heuermann, suspect in Gilgo Beach serial killings, expected to be charged in 4th murder, sources say
Investigators were originally searching for a missing woman named Shannen Gilbert when they stumbled upon the remains of four other individuals in December 2021. The victims, known as the Gilgo Four, were later identified as Barthelmy, Waterman, Costello, and Brainard-Barnes. All four women were in their 20s and had gone missing between 2007 and 2010.
An additional six sets of remains were discovered along Ocean Parkway in March 2011.
Prosecutors argue that the combination of mobile phone records, online searches, burner phones, and DNA evidence presents a compelling case against Heuermann.
Watch: Legal expert on what to expect
New York criminal defense lawyer and former prosecutor David Schwartz spoke with CBS New York ahead of Tuesday's court appearance to put the developments into perspective. He called it a "scientific case."
"Heuermann was indicted and remanded for the first three murders. They made the strategic decision to make the arrest at that moment in time, because they were already surveilling him for about a year, they just didn't want anything to go wrong," he explained. "So they made that arrest, and in the meantime, they were investigating the fourth murder. They were waiting for the mitochondrial DNA analysis on the fourth murder."
Schwartz went on to add "DNA is not a layup."
"They didn't use nuclear DNA, which specifically points to a particular person. They used mitochondrial DNA, because of -- 13 years later, all this time went by, which excludes 99.6% of the population," he said. "So it's scientific evidence, plus circumstantial evidence -- they have his truck, they have phone records, they have all types of other evidence that they're going to piece this case together. So I expect this case to be a complicated case, and I expect it to last a good amount of time."
CBS New York's Carolyn Gusoff and Jennifer McLogan will have team coverage today from the courthouse in Riverhead.
