All rise, hear ye, hear ye, all persons having business in trial,

term part seven of Supreme Court, state of New York, held in, and for the county of Suffolk.

We'll draw it here, give your attendance and ye shall be heard, the Honorable Timothy

Daze and presiding. Be seated and come to order. Good morning.

On the morning of Wednesday, June 17,

2026, the Suffolk County courtroom in Riverhead started to fill up early.

Family members of women who have been dead for years, some of them for more than three decades,

are here to do something almost none of them ever expected to get the chance to do.

To look the man who killed their mother, their sister, their cousin, their daughter, directly in the face.

At the defense table sits Rex Heuerman.

He's 62 years old now, wearing a rumpled gray suit, a blue shirt, and a gold tie.

He doesn't look up much. His hands

rest folded on the table in front of him, and every so often his fingers tap lightly against

the wood, like he's keeping time to a song only he can hear. One by one, the families stand

up. Jasmine Robinson, the cousin of victim Jessica Taylor, doesn't look away from

Rex Hewerman. She says, I can't even put into words the eviscerating hatred I have for you.

Another cousin, Violet Schwager, remembers Jessica is fierce and kind and beautiful, and then turns to the

man who killed her. You chose small

women because you're nothing more than a weak, disgusting coward. Amanda Funderberg, Melissa

Bartholomey's younger sister, the one who was just 15 years old when this man called her house

and taunted her about her dead sister's body, orders him to look at her while she's talking.

He glances up. She tells him, I hope you suffer. Missy Cannes, Marlene Brainerd Barnes's sister,

...