Benjamin Torres never got to grow up with his mother. Valerie Mack disappeared when he was six years old. Her partial remains — dismembered, decapitated, hands severed — were found in Manorville that same year. Nobody knew who she was. For twenty years, she was listed as an unidentified woman. Torres spent his entire childhood, his adolescence, and most of his adult life without knowing what happened to her, without anyone being held accountable, and without a single person in the system telling him his mother's name had been attached to the remains found in those woods.

Rex Heuermann has now pleaded guilty to killing her. That admission gives Torres something he never had — confirmation. But it doesn't give him everything. And that's why he filed a lawsuit that goes beyond the man who strangled his mother.

The complaint names Asa Ellerup and Victoria Heuermann. It accuses them of knowing about the murders, of concealing what was happening inside the home, and of collecting over a million dollars from a documentary about the killings while showing what the lawsuit calls callous disregard for the families left behind. The defense calls it baseless. They say the family cooperated with law enforcement from the beginning. They say Victoria was approximately three years old when Mack was killed. They say prosecutors have never pointed the finger at either woman.

Those are facts worth weighing. But so is the fact that a six-year-old boy lost his mother to a man who dismembered her body and hid the pieces across Long Island — and the people closest to that man collected a documentary payday while the victims' families were still burying what was left. Torres wants accountability beyond the guilty plea. Whether the court gives him that is a question the legal system will answer. But the question of who profited and who suffered is one the public is already asking.

Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/

Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/

Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspod

X Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePod

This publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.

#GilgoBeach #RexHeuermann #ValerieMack #BenjaminTorres #AsaEllerup #VictoriaHeuermann #GilgoBeachKiller #WrongfulDeath #Justice #HiddenKillers