Episode Details

We are talking with former federal prosecutor and attorney Eric Faddis about Rex Heuermann today, where we've obviously learned a lot about him in the last two weeks, including his alleged affinity for sex workers. Uh, we're hearing more and more stories from surviving sex workers who I'm guessing look back going, wow, that could have been me. But a lot of people have had encounters allegedly with Heuermann. Do you think we're gonna continue to see that sort of trend continue? And I also wonder if there were a lot of red flags that these individuals had, but they simply couldn't speak out about because number one, the industry that they're in, not being exactly legal.
 
 Uh, and, uh, then number two, people just not taking someone seriously, uh, simply because of, of what they are involved in. Yeah. You know, um,
 
 uh, as you said, we, we've learned a lot about this and at least according to the allegations that things are still developing. Mm-hmm. It appears that this is Rex Heuermann’s modus hop operandi.
 
 Yeah. He sort of targets the most vulnerable folks that he can, in this case, alleged sex workers. In large part because there is sort of a, a culture of silence, a around that scene. Like you said, it, it's, it's illegal in most states. And, and, um, you know, these folks don't often go to the police and say, Hey, I was about to engage in sex work when an individual got violent with me.
 
 Mm-hmm. You know, uh, historically these folks are subject to violence and, and degradation and, and homicide, uh, and as well as sexual assault and everything else. And so, um, you know, it seems, uh, fitting that he allegedly selected these people as his victims because he thought it would be less likely that he would be caught.
 
 I mean, when you really look at it, and it's something that I, I think a lot of us don't look at very closely. This is an area that really is a playground for abusers and in horrible people taking advantage of these women. It's not always just. Somebody that's paying someone for sex and then they go on their way.
 
 And that's the end of the day. Uh, it, it really seems to be an outlet for this type of character. It really makes me wonder, uh, if there were more things in place or more protections in place, or even, I don't even know if I wanna say it being legal or not, but in theory, if it were, uh, would this sort of individual be allowed to flourish as long as he did?
 
 You know,a good question because, um, like I said, a lot of these folks don't want to come forward and report when they see something problematic in, in a John mm-hmm. Who's trying to, to pick them up because they, they themselves, the sex worker doesn't wanna get caught. You know, perhaps if there were more resources in place, more safe harbor laws, maybe, uh, something that would, uh, insulate.
 
 These sex workers from criminal consequences if they came forward with helpful tips to the police to try and stop these predators. I just wonder if, if having something like that in place could potentially limit or prevent th this sort of horrible repeat tragedy that that's being alleged against Rex Homan, the Long Island serial killer.
 
 What can be done, like speaking from your own expertise? Is there any sort of protections? Let, let's say, A sex worker came up to you and said, look, this was really weird, this encounter that I had. I think someone should know about it. Or I wanna press charges because I was abused or violated in some way, shape or form.
 
 Can that be done? Is that ever done? And, and how would a court look at that considering the nature of, of the relationship between the abuser and the person doing the abuse? You know, I wonder if it's almost, um, the sex worker industry analogous to kind of the drug scene. Like, like here in Colorado for example, um, you know, people when they're using drugs, they often don't want to call the cops.
 
 Sure. And