December 15, 2025 • 10 mins
There has been an update in the story of Tanya Jackson & Tatiana Dykes ("Peaches" and "Baby Doe" from the Long Island Serial Killer episodes back in 2016). After using genetic genealogy to identify both victims earlier this year, authorities charged 66-year-old Florida resident Andrew Dykes with their deaths...
Researched, written, hosted, and produced by Micheal Whelan
If you would like to support this podcast and others, consider heading to https://www.patreon.com/unresolvedpod to become a Patron or Producer
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unresolved--3266604/support.
Researched, written, hosted, and produced by Micheal Whelan
If you would like to support this podcast and others, consider heading to https://www.patreon.com/unresolvedpod to become a Patron or Producer
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/unresolved--3266604/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
The Gilgo Beach investigation stretches back nearly a generation, a
case that grew not from a single crime, but was
kicked off by a single disappearance. In May of twenty ten,
twenty four year old Shannon Gilbert vanished after fleeing a
residence in Oak Beach. When police began searching for her,
they found something else. Entirely along the southern edge of
(00:22):
Long Island, just off of Ocean Parkway, investigators stumbled upon
multiple sets of human remains. By December of twenty ten,
four women were located within a narrow strip of brush
near Gilgo Beach. They would become known as the Gilgo Four.
Over the following spring, six more sets of remains were
found along that same corridor and nearby stretches of the
(00:45):
Barrier Island, ten victims in total, most of whom had
advertised escort or sex work services, creating an early sense
that someone was hunting vulnerable women and discarding them along
the coast. Shannon Gilbert's body surfaced a year later, in
December twenty eleven, deeper in the marshland. Her death was
labeled an accidental drowning, although the search for her had
(01:08):
already anchored Gilgo Beach in the national imagination as the
center of something sprawling and cruel. In the years that followed,
police released sketches, composites, and updates drawn from forensic advancements.
Genetic genealogy eventually breathed new life into several identities once
thought unrecoverable. The long quiet broke in the summer of
(01:29):
twenty twenty three. On July thirteenth, police arrested Rex Huermann,
an architect from Massapequa Park. He was charged with murdering
three of the Gilgo Four, Megan Waterman, Amber Costello, and
Melissa Bartholemy As investigators dug further additional charges followed. By
late twenty twenty four, he stood accused in seven Gilgo
(01:51):
related murders, including the entire Gilgo four. Hureman pleaded not guilty.
For many, his arrest offered something to resolution in a
case that had twisted through years of speculation, Yet the
gravity of what remained unsolved persisted, particularly the handful of
victims who had no name or whose circumstances did not
(02:12):
fit the familiar pattern. Among those mysteries were a mother
and her young daughter known for decades only as Peaches
and Baby Doe. In the summer of nineteen ninety seven,
well before the Gilgo discoveries, a torso was found in
(02:34):
Hempstead Lake State Park. The victim was a young woman
whose identity had been reduced to a single tattoo, a
bitten peach tripping two small beads of ink. Detectives called
her Peaches. For years, she was simply Jane Doe number three.
No one knew she was twenty six year old Tanya
Denise Jackson, an Army veteran from Alabama. Tanya had enlisted
(02:58):
in nineteen ninety three, serving thee through nineteen ninety five,
with assignments in Georgia, Texas, and Missouri. Afterward, she settled
in New York, working as a medical assistant, and there
she raised her daughter, Tatiana. The little girl had been
born in Texas on March seventeenth, nineteen eighty five. When
Tanya was killed in nineteen eighty seven, Tatiana was barely
(03:19):
two years old. Neither had ever been reported missing. Their
families back home had no idea they were even gone.
Police records indicate Tanya and Tatiana were last seen alive
in June of nineteen eighty seven. On June twenty eighth,
Tanya's torsa was found stuffed inside a plastic storage container
wrapped in garbage bags in a wooded section of Hempstead
(03:41):
Lake State Park. Her limbs and head had been removed
and were never recovered. Investigators circulated images of the Peach tattoo,
even placing it in a national tattoo magazine. None of
the leads ever came through. Meanwhile, the unidentified toddler who
vanished with her mother slipped through every bureaucrat crack. There
were no missing persons reports, no concerned relatives on file,
(04:05):
no names to connect the remains when they surfaced. More
than a decade later, a child's skull and bones were
found near Ocean Parkway within the general Gilgo search area.
DNA confirmed that the toddler belonged to Peaches. The little
girl became known to the public only as Baby Doe.
Even then, identities remained elusive, and the case drifted beside
(04:28):
the larger Gilgo timeline like a grim footnote. The child's
remains found in April twenty eleven fit within the geography
of the broader Gilgo investigation. By twenty fifteen, Forensic testing
finally established the biological link between Peaches and the child,
yet neither of their names were known. Traditional DNA analysis
(04:49):
had hit its limit, but then everything changed when investigators
embraced genetic genealogy. In twenty twenty, Nassau County Police sent
samples from both victim to the FBI, which partnered with Authrum,
a private lab specializing in degraded or incomplete DNA technicians
rebuilt Peach's genetic profile into something workable, the equivalent of
(05:12):
reconstructing a voice from scattered signals. By twenty twenty two,
distant relatives began to appear in the data. Detectives made contact,
collected comparison swabs, and followed the threads until the truth emerged.
The woman in the park container was Tanya Denise Jackson.
The toddler found fourteen years later along the parkway was
her daughter, Tatiana Marie Dykes. On April twenty third, twenty
(05:36):
twenty five, police publicly confirmed both identities at a press
conference in Miniola. Detective Captain Stephen Fitzpatrick cautioned that despite
years of speculation, there was no evidence tying Tanya and
Tatiana's death to the alleged Gilgo killer. He put it plainly,
although Tanya and Tatiana have commonly been linked to the
(05:57):
Gilgo Beach serial killings because of the timing and location
of their recovered remains, we are not discounting the possibility
that their cases are unrelated to that investigation. I'm not
saying it is Rex Huerman, and I'm not saying it's not.
We are proceeding as if it's not, keeping our eyes
wide open. Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly stood beside
(06:18):
law enforcement that day. She reminded the public that identification
was only the starting point. The reality is, our work
has just begun, she said. Knowing the identities of the
mom and the little baby is just a first step
to help us get to solving these murders. Investigators had
already located Tatiana's biological father, Andrew Dykes, and described him
(06:40):
at the time as cooperative and not considered a subject.
That position would shift in the months to come. Police
reiterated the original discovery details. Tanya's torso, with its distinctive tattoo,
had been found in nineteen ninety seven inside of a
plastic bin alongside pieces of jewelry and personal belongings. Tatiana's
bones had surfaced in twenty eleven off of Ocean Parkway.
(07:04):
Both cases had stalled for years until modern DNA technology
forced them open. An FBI genetics specialist later framed the
work as an example of what interagency collaboration can accomplish,
calling the identification effort a demonstration of investigators seeking new
avenues to find answers. In December of twenty twenty five,
(07:28):
prosecutors charged Andrew Dikes with the murders of Tanya and Tatiana. Dykes,
a sixty six year old Florida resident and the father
of Tatiana, was arrested in Tampa on a Nassau County
warrant accusing him of two counts of second degree murder.
As of this episode's recording, he awaits extradition to a
New York to stand trial. Charging documents asserted that Tanya
(07:51):
was killed in June nineteen ninety seven, at around the
time her torsa was discovered, and that Tatiana's remains were
concealed for years. If the allegations proved accurate, the toddler
likely died soon after her mother. Law enforcement made no
connection between Andrew Dikes and the other victims linked to
Rex Hureman reports noted explicitly that there was no apparent overlap.
(08:13):
Fitzpatrick himself acknowledged that early on, Dikes had been viewed
as a cooperative figure rather than a suspect, a position
that obviously shifted once new evidence surfaced. For years, Tanya
and Tatiana's case orbited the Gilgo investigation, linked by geography
(08:36):
and timing. Their remains had been found in the same
general coastal corridor where other victims surfaced, and the public
had grown accustomed to seeing Peaches included in the list
of LISK related cases, Yet their circumstances were inherently different.
Tanya's body had been dismembered and stored in a container
with personal items, a very different signature from the more
(08:57):
uniform handling of the Gilgo victims. Most of those victims
were adult sex workers, Tanya may have been working as
a medical assistant, and Tatiana was a toddler. Forensic specialist
routinely point out the mismatch. Michelle Taylor of Forensic Magazine
wrote that the known Gilgo victims were primarily women in
their twenties who advertised online. Unlike Tanya Jackson, who was
(09:20):
older and appeared to be living a more conventional civilian life,
police treaded carefully in public statements. They refused to rule
anything out, while quietly signaling that these tu murders might
belong to a different narrative entirely. With Dykes now officially charged,
some observers believe that Long Island may have endured more
than one predator over the years, or at least more
(09:42):
than one type of violence wearing the mask of anonymity.
But at the very least, these identifications do resolve one
long standing uncertainty. Tanya and Tatiana are no longer among
the unidentified victims haunting the Gilgo case files. Several other
unknown victims do re including an individual described only as
(10:03):
a Chinese female and another known informally as Cherries. Just
like Tanya Jackson, she is recognized for her cherry tattoo.
Those mysteries continue on their own track. For now, investigators
face two unfolding legal paths. There is Rex Huermann's upcoming
trial for the Gilgo Beach murders, and then there is
the extradition and prosecution of Andrew Dikes for the deaths
(10:26):
of Tanya and Tatiana. Future updates will hinge on what
emerges from courtrooms and laboratories. Prosecutors in Nassau County have
urged the public to come forward with any fragment of
information about Tanya's life in the weeks before her death.
Authorities have phrased it simply, every little thing matters until then.
The story, painful as it is, continues to move forward,
(10:50):
and as always, I will continue to update you whenever
new evidence or new information emerges.
The Gilgo Beach investigation stretches back nearly a generation, a
case that grew not from a single crime, but was
kicked off by a single disappearance. In May of twenty ten,
twenty four year old Shannon Gilbert vanished after fleeing a
residence in Oak Beach. When police began searching for her,
they found something else. Entirely along the southern edge of
(00:22):
Long Island, just off of Ocean Parkway, investigators stumbled upon
multiple sets of human remains. By December of twenty ten,
four women were located within a narrow strip of brush
near Gilgo Beach. They would become known as the Gilgo Four.
Over the following spring, six more sets of remains were
found along that same corridor and nearby stretches of the
(00:45):
Barrier Island, ten victims in total, most of whom had
advertised escort or sex work services, creating an early sense
that someone was hunting vulnerable women and discarding them along
the coast. Shannon Gilbert's body surfaced a year later, in
December twenty eleven, deeper in the marshland. Her death was
labeled an accidental drowning, although the search for her had
(01:08):
already anchored Gilgo Beach in the national imagination as the
center of something sprawling and cruel. In the years that followed,
police released sketches, composites, and updates drawn from forensic advancements.
Genetic genealogy eventually breathed new life into several identities once
thought unrecoverable. The long quiet broke in the summer of
(01:29):
twenty twenty three. On July thirteenth, police arrested Rex Huermann,
an architect from Massapequa Park. He was charged with murdering
three of the Gilgo Four, Megan Waterman, Amber Costello, and
Melissa Bartholemy As investigators dug further additional charges followed. By
late twenty twenty four, he stood accused in seven Gilgo
(01:51):
related murders, including the entire Gilgo four. Hureman pleaded not guilty.
For many, his arrest offered something to resolution in a
case that had twisted through years of speculation, Yet the
gravity of what remained unsolved persisted, particularly the handful of
victims who had no name or whose circumstances did not
(02:12):
fit the familiar pattern. Among those mysteries were a mother
and her young daughter known for decades only as Peaches
and Baby Doe. In the summer of nineteen ninety seven,
well before the Gilgo discoveries, a torso was found in
(02:34):
Hempstead Lake State Park. The victim was a young woman
whose identity had been reduced to a single tattoo, a
bitten peach tripping two small beads of ink. Detectives called
her Peaches. For years, she was simply Jane Doe number three.
No one knew she was twenty six year old Tanya
Denise Jackson, an Army veteran from Alabama. Tanya had enlisted
(02:58):
in nineteen ninety three, serving thee through nineteen ninety five,
with assignments in Georgia, Texas, and Missouri. Afterward, she settled
in New York, working as a medical assistant, and there
she raised her daughter, Tatiana. The little girl had been
born in Texas on March seventeenth, nineteen eighty five. When
Tanya was killed in nineteen eighty seven, Tatiana was barely
(03:19):
two years old. Neither had ever been reported missing. Their
families back home had no idea they were even gone.
Police records indicate Tanya and Tatiana were last seen alive
in June of nineteen eighty seven. On June twenty eighth,
Tanya's torsa was found stuffed inside a plastic storage container
wrapped in garbage bags in a wooded section of Hempstead
(03:41):
Lake State Park. Her limbs and head had been removed
and were never recovered. Investigators circulated images of the Peach tattoo,
even placing it in a national tattoo magazine. None of
the leads ever came through. Meanwhile, the unidentified toddler who
vanished with her mother slipped through every bureaucrat crack. There
were no missing persons reports, no concerned relatives on file,
(04:05):
no names to connect the remains when they surfaced. More
than a decade later, a child's skull and bones were
found near Ocean Parkway within the general Gilgo search area.
DNA confirmed that the toddler belonged to Peaches. The little
girl became known to the public only as Baby Doe.
Even then, identities remained elusive, and the case drifted beside
(04:28):
the larger Gilgo timeline like a grim footnote. The child's
remains found in April twenty eleven fit within the geography
of the broader Gilgo investigation. By twenty fifteen, Forensic testing
finally established the biological link between Peaches and the child,
yet neither of their names were known. Traditional DNA analysis
(04:49):
had hit its limit, but then everything changed when investigators
embraced genetic genealogy. In twenty twenty, Nassau County Police sent
samples from both victim to the FBI, which partnered with Authrum,
a private lab specializing in degraded or incomplete DNA technicians
rebuilt Peach's genetic profile into something workable, the equivalent of
(05:12):
reconstructing a voice from scattered signals. By twenty twenty two,
distant relatives began to appear in the data. Detectives made contact,
collected comparison swabs, and followed the threads until the truth emerged.
The woman in the park container was Tanya Denise Jackson.
The toddler found fourteen years later along the parkway was
her daughter, Tatiana Marie Dykes. On April twenty third, twenty
(05:36):
twenty five, police publicly confirmed both identities at a press
conference in Miniola. Detective Captain Stephen Fitzpatrick cautioned that despite
years of speculation, there was no evidence tying Tanya and
Tatiana's death to the alleged Gilgo killer. He put it plainly,
although Tanya and Tatiana have commonly been linked to the
(05:57):
Gilgo Beach serial killings because of the timing and location
of their recovered remains, we are not discounting the possibility
that their cases are unrelated to that investigation. I'm not
saying it is Rex Huerman, and I'm not saying it's not.
We are proceeding as if it's not, keeping our eyes
wide open. Nassau County District Attorney Anne Donnelly stood beside
(06:18):
law enforcement that day. She reminded the public that identification
was only the starting point. The reality is, our work
has just begun, she said. Knowing the identities of the
mom and the little baby is just a first step
to help us get to solving these murders. Investigators had
already located Tatiana's biological father, Andrew Dykes, and described him
(06:40):
at the time as cooperative and not considered a subject.
That position would shift in the months to come. Police
reiterated the original discovery details. Tanya's torso, with its distinctive tattoo,
had been found in nineteen ninety seven inside of a
plastic bin alongside pieces of jewelry and personal belongings. Tatiana's
bones had surfaced in twenty eleven off of Ocean Parkway.
(07:04):
Both cases had stalled for years until modern DNA technology
forced them open. An FBI genetics specialist later framed the
work as an example of what interagency collaboration can accomplish,
calling the identification effort a demonstration of investigators seeking new
avenues to find answers. In December of twenty twenty five,
(07:28):
prosecutors charged Andrew Dikes with the murders of Tanya and Tatiana. Dykes,
a sixty six year old Florida resident and the father
of Tatiana, was arrested in Tampa on a Nassau County
warrant accusing him of two counts of second degree murder.
As of this episode's recording, he awaits extradition to a
New York to stand trial. Charging documents asserted that Tanya
(07:51):
was killed in June nineteen ninety seven, at around the
time her torsa was discovered, and that Tatiana's remains were
concealed for years. If the allegations proved accurate, the toddler
likely died soon after her mother. Law enforcement made no
connection between Andrew Dikes and the other victims linked to
Rex Hureman reports noted explicitly that there was no apparent overlap.
(08:13):
Fitzpatrick himself acknowledged that early on, Dikes had been viewed
as a cooperative figure rather than a suspect, a position
that obviously shifted once new evidence surfaced. For years, Tanya
and Tatiana's case orbited the Gilgo investigation, linked by geography
(08:36):
and timing. Their remains had been found in the same
general coastal corridor where other victims surfaced, and the public
had grown accustomed to seeing Peaches included in the list
of LISK related cases, Yet their circumstances were inherently different.
Tanya's body had been dismembered and stored in a container
with personal items, a very different signature from the more
(08:57):
uniform handling of the Gilgo victims. Most of those victims
were adult sex workers, Tanya may have been working as
a medical assistant, and Tatiana was a toddler. Forensic specialist
routinely point out the mismatch. Michelle Taylor of Forensic Magazine
wrote that the known Gilgo victims were primarily women in
their twenties who advertised online. Unlike Tanya Jackson, who was
(09:20):
older and appeared to be living a more conventional civilian life,
police treaded carefully in public statements. They refused to rule
anything out, while quietly signaling that these tu murders might
belong to a different narrative entirely. With Dykes now officially charged,
some observers believe that Long Island may have endured more
than one predator over the years, or at least more
(09:42):
than one type of violence wearing the mask of anonymity.
But at the very least, these identifications do resolve one
long standing uncertainty. Tanya and Tatiana are no longer among
the unidentified victims haunting the Gilgo case files. Several other
unknown victims do re including an individual described only as
(10:03):
a Chinese female and another known informally as Cherries. Just
like Tanya Jackson, she is recognized for her cherry tattoo.
Those mysteries continue on their own track. For now, investigators
face two unfolding legal paths. There is Rex Huermann's upcoming
trial for the Gilgo Beach murders, and then there is
the extradition and prosecution of Andrew Dikes for the deaths
(10:26):
of Tanya and Tatiana. Future updates will hinge on what
emerges from courtrooms and laboratories. Prosecutors in Nassau County have
urged the public to come forward with any fragment of
information about Tanya's life in the weeks before her death.
Authorities have phrased it simply, every little thing matters until then.
The story, painful as it is, continues to move forward,
(10:50):
and as always, I will continue to update you whenever
new evidence or new information emerges.
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