Gilgo Beach Killer Evidence: Eric Faddis Breaks It Down Live

0:00This is Hidden Tillers Live with Tony Bruceke and Robin Dree. Investigators pulled a deleted word document off Rex Hermann's hard drive, allegedly created in around 2000, modified over several years with sections on supplies, problems, disposal sites and targets. They matched this DNA to Harris found on and near multiple victims using a technology never before admitted in a New York courtroom. And they built the initial connection from a pizza crust, eat through in the trash while being surveilled. When you lay down those pieces side by side, the question isn't whether the prosecution had a case, it's whether the defense ever even had a chance. Eric Fattis is with us to help break down where this case is at and where it's going. Prosecutors, they recovered that word document from Hermann's basement, that hard drive with the sections that allegedly outlined a lot of very specific things, things he tried to

1:00delete off of it as well. When evidence like that lands on a prosecutor's desk, I mean, what does that do to the trajectory of a case? And also, obviously, if it's on a prosecutor's desk, the defense knows that it's there too and that this is going to be part of the evidence. I mean, how do you, because you've seen both sides of this, how do you absorb that type of information? It seems like a slam dunk if you're the prosecutor like, oh, he's got a document talking specifically about dismembering and doing these horrible things that we're done to the victims. And then also, I have a client that has a document that talks about doing exactly what he's accused of doing, not a good place to be in. Eric. Yeah. You know, as a prosecutor, it's kind of like Charlie in the chocolate factory and that's the golden ticket. I mean, that's going to take you to the promise man. That's essentially going to be construed as a confession and confessions are some of the most compelling types of evidence. And so the weight of that alleged document cannot be overstated.

2:04Sure, there are ways to challenge it, but that is a tremendous problem for defense. What would be the way you challenge it? So a few things, especially with modern digital forensics, you know, you would look at who had access to the device from which that document was tight. You look at, you know, IP addresses, where, where was that, where, where was that document generated? If you can look back that far, it depends on a number of factors. And then also, you can look at, you know, whether there had been any modification or manipulation since the prosecution got it, digital forensics folks could look at that. And if you find something suspicious or curious in terms of modifications that might be made, sometimes you can sort of try to hang your hat on that and further open that hole, widen that and and and alleged that, hey, there's some fishy stuff going on on the other side. Are you sure this document's authentic in its entirety?

3:07There are ways to do it, but let me tell you know, I guess because if he wrote it and drafted it and they're able to show it in his in his secret hidey hole in his house or no one else had access, that was probably as damning as well. That'd be a big big big problem. Yeah. Very much so. Well, so whole genome sequencing has never been admitted as evidence in the New York trial before this case. The judge ruled that yes, it can be and would be and would be certainly part of this. Now it gets to be someone else's battle, I guess, in another case to be admitted at another trial, you know, the fact that it was going to be admitted here, I guess there was a long fight of this, you know, over a long period of time. Should it be at it? Should it be allowed? Should it not? It was allowed. Obviously, if the trial never takes place here, how does that then how does it affect other cases going forwarded in New York where they're going to eventually use this is

4:08because it's newer technology? Can they look back on this case and go see it was going to be admitted, they never actually used it. Or is it make it, I guess, a hotter potato for another case that could be attempted to be argued in another courtroom? It's most certainly a precedent that has been set in New York in that sense. This case is kind of historic. Now, because it was set by a trial judge, it would not be binding on any other trial judge, it would not be binding on a Pelachor judge or a Supreme Court judge. So it's binding, but it's what's called persuasive authority. And that happens all the time when there are disputes about experts testimony and the attorneys say, hey, look, this judge said it was sufficiently reliable to admit. Our case is very similar. New judge, you should admit this and as practicing attorneys, we have a catch of orders from judges on issues like this that we then cite to in subsequent cases saying, hey, look,

5:10this judge thought it was good enough, you should think it's good enough to. It's really interesting. From what I've researched, again, this whole genome sequencing thing is new to me, too, because they're just rolling it out, right? From what I understand, in Tony, you probably know more about this than I do. They're used to because of the hairs, really, it's because it's the first time they're actually able to extract the whole DNA sequence of someone from hair and they couldn't do it typical DNA that's been done past cases. So just my thought experiment on this as human learning about this whole DNA sequencing and seeing how sloppy he was with human hair for so long, maybe again, part of that mental gyration he's doing about how to keep everything secret so he can keep it in his own little narcissistic head. He might have hairs all over that house all over everything else that they'd be able to sequence and he'd lose control. Again, I think it all comes back to that control. Interesting. Yeah, no, I hear you. I think some of these folks are kind of detached from reality and have this delusion that

6:11they're smarter than everybody else, including the law. And when these revelations come out, it can be a bit of a reality check. I still think that's a huge part of this case and other long other cases of serial killers that span decades, really, where you start your criminal enterprise of murdering people when technology was saying I can behave this way, the technology and forensics involved and they didn't. There have been cases in the past where people have pled guilty and then I've gotten that later because they found out somebody else did it. And that they pled guilty for whatever reason they did at the time. You got seven murders here. So you could be, and I'm not saying this is, but I'm saying you could be looking at a scenario where he is responsible for like five of the seven or six of the seven. I mean, you could be having one where maybe he isn't. They've argued for a long time. The very first victim from 93 was not him, but they did find a hair on that one.

7:12And that's how they connected that one. It's not a ton of evidence that connects Rex here and it was very first victim all the way back in 1993. Let's just for the sake of argument without getting into the weeds too much. Let's say something happens here and somebody comes forward or there's undeniable evidence that one of the seven was not Rex here, but for whatever reason he's pleading guilty because he is responsible truly for five of the seven or whatever it may be. Let's say that comes along in the coming years. What does that do to this? What does that do to this conviction or his guilty plea? Does that give him any sort of advantage down the line if he were to be like, no, what? Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe prison doesn't suit me so well. And then this person over here is truly responsible for this one that I pled to. And clearly it wasn't me. I've been saying that along. I just did it to these. Is it where they can look back and go, well, yeah, you're still there for the other six

8:12and those all stand or does that blow the whole damn thing up and then have to make it be retried because they're all interconnected into one specific case really. Another separate charges, but it's all in in the one ruling. Oh, that's great question. So the appellate courts usually favor finality. They don't like to reopen stuff. They don't like to send stuff back to the trial court overture convictions. They prefer to have this secured finality within these cases. So if they were to take place, I think that newly discovered expulpatory evidence is always a potential reason to withdraw a plea of guilty. And so would it be withdrawn, you know, it could be withdrawn with respect to that one specific killing? But that cast further down on the other killings at a, you know, future appellate stage. It's at least possible, you know, Rex could save five years from now if that were to happen

9:15that, hey, actually, this other guy did this. When I copped to these, please, I was not in my right mind. I had been a custody for a long time. My whole life had fallen apart and everything else. So there's no certainty that all of the other convictions would be appelled, although an appellate court judge would, I believe, try to angle towards upholding the other connections. Now is that something a defense attorney is going to counsel him on about a possibility of doing or if they, or if they, because again, these are questions I'd love throwing at Bob Mata too, is like, hey, or are they just going to do their job and grind it out and give them all these options or they're going to say to themselves, I'm not going to strategize that with them because he's a guilty douche. You have to at least advise the client about, and I've had that conversation, not those specific words, but you have to advise the client as to post-conviction consequences, potential post-conviction remedies.

10:15So you can speak in broad general terms about it, but at the same token, if you're the lawyer and your client's going in there to plead guilty, you have to have a reasonable belief that that is a valid plea. And so you can't kind of be like, hey, if someone, you know, great happens later for your case, and you can try to, you know, wiggle out of this or something, you kind of have to go in there saying, hey, we are taking responsibility and we is the defense, and that implicates the attorney. Right, and that's my question, sorry, Tony, it was because I love Tony's thought experiment on that. That's really intriguing. And at the same time, though, is that something a defense attorney, I guess, is really going to do in those circumstances, given the fact that like you said, hey, if we're pleading guilty, and it means we're taking ownership of it all, a good point. Yeah, yeah, that's user health. I mean, like in the co-burger situation where part of the stipulation was there's no going back here. Once you're pleading, you're done. There's no appeals. You're not allowed to appeal.

11:16I would imagine, I mean, do you see a world here where the judge is going to accept whatever agreement this is, where he doesn't remove all possibilities of any sort of parole or any sort of appealing this in any way, shape, or form down the line, no matter what? I think the prosecutor is going to be diligent in terms of divesting, rexheroman, of any potential rights down the road to try to undo this. That being said, the judge doesn't have complete control over what happens in the future, and if in your hypothetical, it was proven that someone else did at least one of these killings, even if the judge said, hey, there's no resettancing, there's no reconsideration of the plea, there's not going to be any of that, you don't have that right. I think hypothetically the Constitution would confer that right, and that would trump anything that is in the plea agreement or anything the judge's order.

12:17What do you think made him make this decision? Was it an obviously just conjecture? Do you think it was him? It was an attorney sitting down going, having to come to Jesus' meeting of like, look, we've lost everything that we've attempted to throw in front of this judge leading up to this trial. All of our emotions have failed. All the things we try to get excluded are coming in. This is not going to go good. It's just not Rex, and if you want anything, if you want to save a little bit of whatever exists for your family, whatever little bit of dignity you have left, you should probably plea. Or do you think this was Rex going to his attorney and saying, I'm out, I think we should end this right now. I did it. I mean, how do you think, how do you think that went down behind closed doors? I got to imagine it was sort of at the attorney's be asked because Rex Herman just doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who's going to come, oh, hadn't hand and saying, oh, you

13:21know what? I'm going to do the right thing and take responsibility and I'm going to save these victims, families, all of this nightmare of stuff that's going to happen to trial. You know the strike, like that kind of guy, but I just don't know. I think the attorney is more like, hey, dude, we've exhausted. All of our potential outs, you don't have any other outs, man. If you want to save, like you said, some modicum of dignity, some very trivial minor concessions that we might be able to build into it, now's your chance to do it. And that that's how I imagined it went down. Yeah. I wonder, you know, at some point, Eric, I mean, do you see this at all in clients of any age where, I mean, Rex isn't elderly, but you know, he's getting more up there. You know, he's got a handful of good years left. Do you see, is there any correlation between an age at which someone says, screw it, I'm just whatever, I got 10, 20 years left.

14:23If I keep fighting this, I'm just going to be going in and out of court rooms until I'm dead. This is, I'll just, I'm going to make peace with this and I'm going to figure out what life is like behind bars. Do you ever see more backing down versus more fight depending on the age of the, of the defendants? Good question. Oh, you'd be surprised totally. So, you know, you might have a 20 year old client and let's say the evidence is significant and the offer is five years. Well, to a 20 year old, five years, that's a quarter of their life. That seems like forever. They're like, hey, I'm not, I've got to throw away my life to do this. Let's fight this. Whereas if you're talking about someone in their 50, 60, 70s, you know, beyond, sometimes they do not have that, they have a different perspective, perspective in terms of time, in terms of headache, in terms of trauma, how, how shitty is this going to be for me? Is there a less painful alternative?

15:24I see that a lot more of the folks who are up in age interest on it, it's at Donald Adelson. Well, Donna, I think probably believes she will live forever. I think you get deep down with her. I think she might think she's a deity of some sort, you know, if you really, if you really do the digging, yeah, everybody starts in the comments section and sub stack and YouTube on this segment. The links are in the descriptions. But more on this case and others, then press subscribe now and don't miss a moment of true crime coverage from Tony Bruski and the Hidden Killers podcast.