A Long Island judge has ordered accused Gilgo Beach serial killer Rex Heuermann to submit to a cheek swab for DNA testing in the high-profile murder case — despite pleas from his lawyer.
In a three-page decision, Suffolk County Supreme Court Judge Timothy Mazzei shot down objections by the suspected killer’s lawyers and ordered the test.
“The court finds that contrary to the defendant’s contentions, there is probable cause to believe that the defendant committed the crimes charged and, therefore, a basis to compel the buccal swab,” Mazzei wrote.
The ruling presents a major setback for Heuerman, a 59-year-old architect charged with three counts of murder in the deaths of three women whose bodies were found dumped along Gilgo Beach in December 2010.
Their deaths remained unsolved until last year when Suffolk County cops reopened the case and identified Heuermann as the suspect based on phone records, eye-witness accounts and a single strand of hair found on one of the bodies that “was linked by DNA analysis to a person of Caucasian/European descent,” Mazzei wrote.
According to police and prosecutors, that led them to Heuermann, who was arrested outside his Midtown offices on July 13 and charged with the killings of Amber Lynn Costello, Megan Waterman and Melissa Barthelemy, who were all identified by cops as sex workers.
Heuermann is also the prime suspect in the death of a fourth woman Maureen Brainard-Barnes, with all four victims known collectively as the “Gilgo Four.”
The damning strand of hair, which was a loose match for DNA plucked from a napkin and a pizza crust discarded near the accused killer’s office was found in a burlap bag used to conceal Waterman’s body.
Danielle Coysh, a member of Heuermann’s legal team, had argued that prosecutors still didn’t have enough “probable cause” to collect a new DNA sample from her client.
“The assertions contained in the people’s moving papers might be construed as rising to the level of a reasonable suspicion, but that is a far cry from the standard of probable cause required to justify granting the order sought by the people,” Coysh wrote in court papers.
The judge, however, thought otherwise.
New York State and Suffolk County police also combed through Heuermann’s Massapequa Park home looking for body parts or “trophies” from the grisly killings, even digging up the backyard.
Cops said they found a walk-in, concrete-lined gun vault, but have not divulged if any evidence was recovered that could tie the hulking architect to the slayings.
Meanwhile, Heuermann’s wife filed for divorce after the arrest, with police saying she told cops she was “shocked” and “disgusted” by the allegations against him.
“I woke up in the middle of the night shivering,” Asa Ellerup told The Post last month.
“My children cry themselves to sleep,” Ellerup said. “I mean, they’re not children. They’re grown adults but they’re my children.”
Ellerup, 59, and her two children — Christopher Sheridan, 33, and Victoria Heuermann, 26 — returned to the home after police ended their 12-day search last month to find it in ruins.