I'm posting this because I'm interested in your comments about it; maybe you can help me add some pieces to a puzzle. I can't be too specific now, and I know that's frustrating - obviously it impedes your ability to assess my remarks; I hope I can be more forthcoming soon. Until recently, I was only peripherally aware of the Oak Beach killings, as I no longer live on Long Island. But a few weeks ago I did a sort of "where are they now" search on someone I once knew; he was sort of a scary person, and probably the first person I would've thought of if playing the "who from your hometown would you imagine to be a serial killer" game. When seeing that the internet info for this person (I'll call him POI from here on) showed an Oak Beach address for sometime after the period I knew him, I remembered the news stories about the serial killings. At which point I easily found a reference to the POI and burlap; he had access to plenty of it. Wondering if he might actually be a suspect in the case, on a lark I Google'd his name with the word "killer", immediately turning up a very odd claim by a blogger that my POI is the killer. I wrote the blogger twice, and he hasn't responded. My curiosity piqued, and already armed with my own knowledge of the POI, I continued to look into his activities over recent years, and he seems more and more like "a fit". Familiarity with the Oak Beach/Gilgo area? Check. Apartment in NYC? Check. Familiarity with police procedures (though he's not a cop or ex-cop), technologically savvy, independently wealthy, intelligent, persuasive and manipulative? "Checks" all around (the only major thing that differs from the standard LISK profiles I see is the age - this guy would have been slightly older). And, as I say, a bad apple, who was involved in two businesses (one illegal, one not) that are intrinsically related to the world that prostitutes live in. Another thing about my POI - he's dead, having passed away early last year. There are some odd things about that (the death, I mean, like no obits or funeral notices, but I guess I can understand that), and if I ever wrote a fictionalized novel of this I'd have all sorts of curious tangents to employ as plot lines.
Anyway, I looked into it for a couple of weeks (on the net, and by talking to other people who had known the POI); I was trying to stay objective about it even as my certainty that it was at least a "hot lead" grew. The POI would surely, I surmised, be someone the police were already looking at; he'd had run-in's with the law previously. Still, I gave the TIPS line a call, but decided not to give them my story because I wasn't particularly impressed with the person I spoke with (and that could just be my personal experience, they might be top-notch otherwise). I dug around online for a Suffolk homicide number, discovered that the ones I was dialing weren't working, and finally got a good number from the front-desk of my hometown's police department. I spoke to a homicide detective who assured me he'd relay the information to the proper department. After a week, when I discovered a new link that was probably more significant than anything I'd already described to the detective, I called that detective back; he suggested I email him some information, which I did. After about another week went by (with, obviously, no contact from anyone), I called someone who is not a policeman but who would know them, and who would have a professional interest in seeing that good leads are pursued; someone who is, from what I can see on the net, a respected and competent person. Well, my story pretty much blew him away; he said that he'd heard so many stories about the LISK, but that mine really had something to it. He said he knows all the people on the task force dedicated to this crime, and that he'd be able to find out right away if my POI's name was in the database being worked. So I sent him a long email with links and pics. He got back to me saying that he'd forwarded my info to a certain detective (so, by inference, perhaps that means that my POI's name was not being looked at), and that he considered it likely that the detective would contact me. More than a week has gone by, and I've not been contacted.
That's where it stands now. Maybe I'll be contacted next week, or maybe never. I can't very well keep prodding my recent contact, as he's done what he can to alert the police of my lead. In fact, other than write a fictionalized novel about it (and I'm only half-kidding there), I guess there's not much else I can do. To the extent that I can, I'd be happy to answer questions you might have about my POI, though I'm not about to name him here or privately at this time; he did have a family. I'll say (maddeningly!) that I can see this POI not being a serial killer proper, perhaps more driven by a "motive" for dumping bodies where he did.
