The Gilgo Beach victim previously known as Jane Doe No. 7 has been identified as a 34-year-old Manhattan woman, according to police probing the infamous Gilgo Beach killings.

Who was Karen Vergata?

Karen Vergata vanished on February 14, 1996, according to Suffolk County District Attorney Ray Tierney on Friday morning.

Her legs were discovered in a plastic bag at Davis Park on the bayside of Fire Island’s Blue Point Beach two months later, on April 20.

At the time of her disappearance, Vergata was living on West 45th Street and is believed to have been working as an escort.

She was not reported missing.

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According to the Doe Network, at the time of the discovery of the Fire Island remains, authorities could only identify that the victim was a white lady with multiple unique scars, including indications of surgery on her left ankle.

Her skull was discovered on April 11, 2011, among the partially dismembered remains of Jane Doe No. 3, also known as “Peaches,” off Ocean Parkway in Nassau County, west of Tobay Beach.

Tierney said Vergata’s two sets of remains were linked by DNA research in July 2011 and were subsequently identified conclusively in October 2022 thanks to genetic genealogy and a related buccal swab.

While Vergata’s immediate family was informed of her death, Tierney requested that the three-decade-old murder case be kept “confidential.”

“We will continue to work on this case, just as we did with the Gilgo Four investigation.” “At this time, we will not comment on what, if any, suspects we have developed,” he said on Friday.

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Rex Heuermann, 59, of Massapequa Park, was arrested and charged last month with the killings of three women whose bodies were discovered a few miles further east down Ocean Parkway, near Gilgo Beach, in December 2010.

Investigators have yet to ascertain whether Heuermann is also a suspect in the deaths of many other remains discovered in the area, including those of Jane Doe No. 7, Peaches, Jessica Taylor, and Valerie Mack.