Route 29 Stalker sufferer’s sister claims sketch of thriller assassin seems to be like Gilgo Seashore serial killer suspect Rex Heuermann as she calls on cops to re-open decade’s-old chilly case

Members of the family of a girl who was killed practically thirty years in the past in an unsolved case are urging police to research her dying in reference to accused Gilgo Seashore homicide suspect Rex Heuermann. 

There seems to be a resemblance between Heuermann, 60, and a police sketch of the presumed killer of Alicia Showalter Reynolds, who was murdered in March 1996.

Alicia was a promising graduate scholar at Johns Hopkins College and dealing on a vaccine for a parasitic an infection on the time of her vanishing. 

She was 25 years outdated when she was killed by the still-unidentified Route 29 Stalker whereas driving from Baltimore to Charlottesville. 

Alicia’s household lately observed similarities between Heuermann and the sketch of the Route 29 Stalker and have now requested investigators to discover this potential connection.

The circumstances surrounding Reynolds disappearance are deeply unsettling. 

She was on a 150-mile journey to buy groceries along with her mom, Sadie Showalter, and had deliberate to satisfy her at round 10:30am. 

When Alicia didn’t arrive, Sadie waited on the mall, considering dangerous climate or unexpected circumstances had delayed her daughter. 

Later the identical day, at 6 pm, Alicia’s automobile was discovered deserted alongside the shoulder of Route 29 close to Culpeper, Virginia, with a white paper serviette positioned underneath the windshield wiper – a sign generally used to point a problem with the car. 

It was later found that there was nothing improper with the automobile. Three witnesses additionally got here ahead to inform police that Alicia had been noticed talking with a clean-cut white male who had been driving a dark-colored pick-up truck.

Alicia’s physique was not discovered for one more two months. Her physique had been dumped in woods 15 miles east of Culpeper. 

The investigation by Virginia State Police into Alicia’s dying stays lively and ongoing with the household nonetheless ready for solutions in her disappearance and homicide some 27 years later. 

Barbara Josenhans, Alicia’s youthful sister, famous how she had given up hope of discovering her sister’s killer years in the past. 

However upon noticing the resemblance between Heuermann and a police sketch of the Route 29 Stalker, Barbara has urged investigators to delve deeper into the potential connection. 

Barbara emphasised the similarities in Heuermann’s facial options, significantly the cheeks, declaring that he would have been roughly 32 or 33 years outdated on the time of Alicia’s homicide. 

‘It is the cheeks, there’s one thing concerning the cheeks,’ Barbara Josenhans, Alicia’s youthful sister informed The Solar.

‘It is fairly hanging […] he would’ve been round 32 or 33 on the time. Iwonder if he is ever been questioned about it. If he hasn’t he needs to be.’

There are different doable coincidences too: property information reveal that Heuermann’s mom has resided in Palmyra, Virginia, since a minimum of 1994 – about 50 miles from the place Alicia was final seen alive. 

Moreover, in a deposition for an unrelated lawsuit, Heuermann admitted to touring to Virginia on a number of events all through 2018. 

‘She was sister,’ Barbara recalled. ‘She was 25 when she died and I used to be 20. We had been very completely different folks […] however we had been simply on the cusp of our grownup relationship.

‘It was extremely unfair that this occurred to Alicia. It was completely random and unpredictable.

‘It is bizarre to suppose that had she been killed in a automobile accident, it might’ve been simpler to deal with in some methods than her being murdered. It would not make sense, however psychologically, it does.’

Different disturbing info have additionally subsequently come to gentle together with how between February and March 1996, 23 ladies drivers had lights flashed at them or horns blasted on or close to Route 29 in an try to get them to drag over. 

Some had been additionally shouted at that they’d one thing improper with their automobile. 

Three ladies who did cease had been taken to a payphone with out points, however the week earlier than Alicia’s disappearance, one other girl was stopped on the freeway by a person who used the identical ploy that one thing was improper along with her automobile.

He managed to get her inside his personal pickup truck after providing to offer her a journey, earlier than attacking her with a screwdriver. 

The lady was in a position to escape after leaping out of passenger door.

Investigators consider that man was probably the identical one who was noticed with Alicia the day she disappeared.

Virginia State Police consider the person might have been conducting ‘take a look at runs’ earlier than lastly summoning up the braveness to kill. 

Regulation enforcement haven’t commented on whether or not Heuermann is being thought of a suspect in Alicia’s case. 

‘State police doesn’t touch upon potential suspects, confirmed or unconfirmed,’ police mentioned in an announcement. 

‘Regardless of the passage of greater than twenty years and the scrutiny of greater than 10,000 leads, Virginia State Police continues to actively pursue the disappearance and homicide of Alicia Showalter Reynolds.

‘State police stay hopeful that this case will come to a profitable decision and proceed to encourage the general public to return ahead with any data associated to the investigation.’

Reynolds’ household hopes for some type of closure whereas additionally being cautious of the emotional toll a trial may take. 

‘I need to consider the man is lifeless, fairly frankly,’ Barbara mentioned to The Solar.

‘That will make all the things simpler […] one of many hardest components of all this has been watching my mother and father take care of their grief, whereas additionally coping with my very own.

‘At this level, 27 years later, though I might love for the case to be solved, I might hate for there to be a courtroom trial.

‘Coping with the trial, seeing this particular person within the flesh, and reliving all of it could be extra disturbing than useful, for me, a minimum of.

‘I do not know if the remainder of my household really feel the identical means, however that is positively the place I stand.’

As investigations into Heuermann’s alleged crimes increase, authorities at the moment are confronted with the difficult activity of revisiting chilly instances and contemplating potential connections to different unsolved murders throughout the nation.

Different police departments throughout the nation are wanting again by way of chilly instances to research Heuermann for any potential connection to different unsolved murders. 

Heuermann is at the moment in custody in New York, dealing with costs to which he has pleaded not responsible referring to the murders of a number of intercourse employees alongside Gilgo Seashore on Lengthy Island, New York. 

In July, Heuermann was charged with the murders of Melissa Barthelemy, Megan Waterman, and Amber Costello. 

The three intercourse employees had been discovered sure and wrapped in burlap alongside a desolate beachfront parkway in 2010.