A decades-long saga came to an end in a Suffolk County courtroom on Wednesday, as a six-foot-four man dressed in a black suit and blue tie stood across from a judge and confessed to the gruesome details of murdering eight women.
Rex Heuermann appeared expressionless as he confirmed to Judge Timothy Mazzei that he had strangled and bound them each in the same manner before dropping their remains along Long Island's remote beaches.
He answered mostly "Yes" to each of the judge's questions about his crimes, not looking back at the courtroom packed with victims' family members, some of whom stifled cries.
The families of the women had waited for over a decade, as it took years for investigators to solve the murders that had haunted many Long Islanders.
"A lot of people would talk about it - it was not taboo," Sandra Symon, a high school classmate of Heuermann told the BBC. "Everybody had a theory."
