Search For Shannan Gilbert Continues At Oak Beach

Suffolk Police search teams are returning to Oak Beach marshland this morning in the continuing quest to find Shannan Gilbert, a 24-year-old New Jersey escort who went missing 19 months ago.

It was a search for Gilbert, last seen on May 1, 2010 fleeing a home in Oak Beach, that led the discovery of the first of 10 sets of human remains along Ocean Parkway between Robert Moses Causeway and Jones Beach this past year.

Those victims are reportedly the work of a lone male Long Island serial killer, police stated earlier this month, and are not connected to the Gilbert case, stated police. Police surmise Gilbert ran into the quicksand-like marsh area and likely drowned and that her body is under the marshland.

Police resumed the Gilbert beach effort on December 5 and the week-long effort turned up various items identified by family members to have belonged to Gilbert. The list includes shoes, jeans, a cell phone, lip gloss and a pocketbook.

Last week’s search was expected to be a two-day effort given favorable weather conditions, police stated, and resulting searches were due to available manpower. Last June police conducted a very similar but “less intensive” search in the area, police told Patch this weekend.

SCPD investigators said the search team spent several hours pre-planning last [December 5] Monday’s activities and that made the process much more efficient. The search focused on 90 points of interests gleamed from FBI aerial photographs taken this past spring.

Last week’s search was extended once the pocketbook was discovered on Tuesday. On Wednesday police found the other items they believe likely belong to Gilbert. Low water levels and the warmer than usual December weather has helped the search effort, said police. 

At this point, search team time resources are assigned on a day to day basis based upon progress, pre-planning and operational needs. 

“Obviously once some of her property was found in that area and we adapted our plans,” police told Patch.

The SCPD is not providing cost estimates of the search effort. Overtime costs are minimized by the reallocation of resources from other assignments, said police.

Police said they have sought expertise from several outside sources including the Suffolk County Vector Control and the NYC Medical Examiners Office given the terrain of the search and said their expertise is very relevant to the task at hand.