Some advocates of “decarceration” — reducing prison populations — claim that long prison sentences aren’t necessary because people age out of crime by their late 30s. But many serial killers are active in their 40s and 50s, while a few keep killing even in their 80s. In Long Island, a 59-year-old man was recently arrested for serial killings allegedly committed in his mid-40s. If he is convicted, he will be eligible for “elder parole” under a bill recently passed by New York’s legislature, which allows even serial killers to be released if they have reached age 55 and have served at least 15 years.
An architect has been charged over the deaths of three out of up to 11 victims in the Gilgo Beach murders in New York state over a decade ago.
Rex Heuermann, 59, is charged with killing Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman and Amber Costello. He is suspected in a fourth woman’s death.
Detectives say they matched DNA from pizza that the suspect ate to genetic material found on the women’s remains.
Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison told a news conference on Friday: “Rex Heuermann is a demon that walks among us – a predator that ruined families.”
The suspect, who was arrested at his home on Thursday night, is facing three counts of first-degree murder and three counts of second-degree murder in the three women’s deaths. The judge in the case ordered that he remain in custody, citing the “extreme depravity” of the crimes.
New York’s legislature recently approved legislation to free many killers, making parole available to people who were sentenced to life without parole for their killings, such as serial killers who have reached age 55 and have served at least 15 years in prison. Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal boasts that this legislation, S2423, is “good news…for incarcerated New Yorkers.”
Criminal justice experts criticized the legislation. “Sure, there’s been a sharp increase in crime throughout New York State over the last few years; but incarcerated New Yorkers (a/k/a the mostly violent felons with a high likelihood of recidivating populating the state’s prisons)” are getting “more good news” at the expense of public safety, laments Rafael Mangual of the Manhattan Institute.
Last year, a murderer was arrested for killing again at age 83 after two prior murder convictions in New York State. Thus, it’s wrong to claim that inmates swiftly age of out of crime, or that inmates can safely be released just because they have reached a particular age, as supporters of New York’s Elder Parole bill claim.
Advocates of decarceration falsely claim people age out of crime after ten or fifteen years, and thus should be released. The George Soros-funded Law Enforcement Action Partnership claimed to the Virginia legislature that if “people entered prison over a decade ago,” “their continued incarceration does very little, if anything, to maintain safety.” It made that claim in support of a bill, SB 378, that would have allowed inmates to seek release after 10 or 15 years regardless of what crime they had committed. Another supporter of the bill claimed that “people age out of crime by their late thirty’s [sic].”
Returning to crime after being released is typical for inmates, according to a 2022 report by the U.S. Sentencing Commission. It documented that problem in a 116-page report titled “Recidivism of Federal Violent Offenders Released in 2010.” Over an eight-year period, violent offenders returned to crime at a 63.8% rate. The median time to rearrest was 16 months for these violent offenders. So, most violent offenders released from prison committed more crimes. Even among those offenders over age 60, 25.1% of violent offenders were rearrested for committing new crimes.
There are many examples of killers murdering people yet again after being paroled. One example is Kenneth McDuff, the “broomstick killer.” At the age of 19, after being paroled, McDuff and an accomplice kidnapped three teenagers. He shot and killed two boys, then killed a girl after raping her and torturing her with burns and a broomstick. Later, after being paroled yet again, he murdered additional women — as many as 15 women in several different states.
Many famous serial killers were still active in their 50s. Albert Fish started killing at age 54, and Dorothea Puente started at age 53. Other notorious serial killers were active into their 50s, such as Peter Tobin (up to age 60), John Reginald Christie (up to age 53), and Ted Kaczynski (into his 50s).
Some murderers continue to kill even at an advanced age. At the age of 76, Albert Flick killed a woman, stabbing her at least 11 times while her twin sons watched. He had previously been imprisoned from 1979 to 2004 for killing his wife by stabbing her 14 times in front of her daughter.
Marceline Harvey was arrested for killing again at age 83, after two prior convictions in New York State. Harvey, who gender-transitioned after being released from prison, was arrested after previously spending three decades in prison for killing one girlfriend, and before that, spending twenty years in prison for killing an earlier girlfriend. Twice, Harvey had been paroled and released after deliberately murdering someone.
