'Lost Girls' Author On Arrest In LISK Murder: 'A Stunning Development'

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“I didn’t see it coming,” he said. “Nobody tipped me off — when I saw the news Friday morning, I was amazed.”

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Kolker first heard about the case while working full-time for New York Magazine, focused on a string of criminal justice stories on Long Island. He and his editor discussed the story, and Kolker initially decided to hold off, thinking the case might be quickly solved.

“I was proven wrong,” Kolker said, of the case that spanned years and left the families of the victims desperately searching for answers.

Ultimately, Kolker said he found himself drawn back to the Gilgo Beach killings, not from a true-crime perspective, but because he wanted to shed light and insight on what the lives were like for the families who’d had their loved ones ripped away violently, never to be seen again.

“My favorite kind of journalism is one where I can help people understand a world that they couldn’t understand themselves. What life is like for the victims, and their families,” he said.

The book, he said, was a portrait of some of those families, some of whom were in crisis long before the brutal deaths of the girls they loved disappeared — and some, who saw their lives irrevocably altered after they were lost forever.

The experience of weaving together the women’s stories and that of their families “defied expectation,” Kolker said. “I learned about their lives — what makes people vulnerable in our society, and I wanted to portray that. These girls were not just sex workers — that was apparent from the start.”

When others, too, began to interview the families, putting a real and human face on the unthinkable losses they’d suffered, Kolker said he realized that while some might not have written a book about the Gilgo Beach killings until there was an arrest, “a book about the families made sense to me. I decided to push forward.”

Asked if he believes there might be others involved in the deaths of the other women, a man, and a toddler whose remains were ultimately found — or if Heuermann himself might have other victims, Kolker said it was a question worth pondering.

“Everything is on the table right now,” he said. “He might be responsible for other bodies we know about, or there might be others we don’t know about yet. . . It’s hard to believe that he would have stopped.”

Kolker said he’s long had his doubts that others were involved.

“I never bought into the ‘crime ring idea’, a team of people,” he said.

Reflecting on the arrest, Kolker said: “I’m amazed that he was hiding in plain sight. I’m amazed he had this public-facing job — he was out circulating with established clients, well-off people, and leading this double life. I always assumed he’d be more of a loner. But he has a family. That surprised me.”

Other things, however, didn’t surprise, Kolker said.

“That he’s in Massapequa, so close to the bodies — that he commuted to midtown a lot,” he said.

Over the years that he researched the book, Kolker said many had thought whoever had killed the women would be a Long Island native, because “that person would understand where to go to avoid notice,” he said.

One thing he’s learned over the course of documenting one of the most gripping serial killer cases of a generation, was that just because police are quiet, it doesn’t mean they aren’t doing anything, Kolker said.

“They’re just operating very quietly. They might have the general public thinking that they don’t know a thing, that they’re at Square One, and then one day, there’s a huge announcement that they didn’t see coming. I have an appreciation for that now.”

When asked if he’d consider writing another book, based on the arrest, Kolker said he was very aware that the story would change now.

“It’s about Rex Heuermann. I’m happy to be following it and contributing wherever I can, but I’m only as qualified as everyone else.” Kolker said.

Lost Girls was never a book about law enforcement, it was about the impact on the families left behind, he said. “I’d be starting at zero to write about Rex Heuermann. But I’m available.”

However, as a new chapter unfolds and the facts are revealed, Kolker said he was left forever altered by the interviews he did with the families of the victims.

“What I learned about the victims were they weren’t just plot devices,” he said. “They didn’t live off the grid. They had families. Many had kids. All had sisters and mothers who cared about them, who expected the police to pay attention when they disappeared — and then they didn’t. They weren’t trafficked in from foreign lands, with no one knowing their names. Everyone knew their names.”

Other things became clear with the arrest, Kolker said. Heuermann, a large, tall man that one witness described as an “ogre,” according to Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney, “clearly selected tiny women — people he really wanted to dominate.”

And, when asked about the doll that was reportedly found in Heuermann’s home, Kolker said it was possibly stolen from the girls’ burial sites, where, in years’ past, many left dolls and other tokens. Or, it could have just belonged to his wife or daughter, Kolker said.

When asked if the doll might have been the “trophy” of a serial killer, Kolker said after the remains were discovered, “some speculated from the beginning that the way the women were buried, near each other — that it was meant to be a trophy ground. A place he could drive by, and know they were there.”

Of the arrest, Kolker concluded, “I’m mostly amazed. And of course, I know that there’s no such thing as closure. But maybe this helps the family members grieve in a different way. It’s been so many years since I actively worked on the book — and then there was the movie made in between.”

The last time he saw the family members was when the movie premiered, before the pandemic. To see them at the news conference Friday, he said, the loved ones left behind had all aged about 10 years, something that was moving and a testament to a deep wound that may never truly heal.

“To have this happen now, just shows how the passage of time can really lead to more and more twists and turns, and surprises. Nothing stays the same,” Kolker said. “This case has a lot of media attention and it never stops changing.”

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