LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK: Karen Vergata, a victim of the Gilgo Beach killings, was found dead on Fire Island more than two decades ago. Sadly, her sons were not informed about her death before the official press conference announcing the discovery this Friday, August 4.
Upon learning the tragic news, Eric Doherty expressed deep distress and grief over the loss of his mother, whose remains were found on separate occasions in 1996 and 2011, and had been unidentified until now. "He just thought [Vergata] was missing," his girlfriend Michelle Nolan, told The NY Post. "We wondered what happened to her. But she had a habit of just not being in contact," Vergata’s step-sister Brenda said. "We just assumed [she was dead]. No one heard from her in 20 years."
Who are Eric and Gary Doherty?
Eric and his older brother Gary are the biological sons of Karen Vergata and Gunther Lind. Eric was born in 1990 and both the brothers were adopted at a young age by Edward and Diane Doherty in 1992. Growing up, they had some knowledge of their biological mother but were never informed about the discovery and identification of her remains in the Gilgo Beach killings case, leaving them in the dark about the tragic fate of their biological mother until the recent press conference. "We just…we didn’t have any information," Nolan said. "Their [adoptive mother] just called to let them know."
Karen Vergata was believed to be a 'drug user'
According to Nolan, Vergata, who went missing on February 14, 1994, at 34 years old, was believed to be a drug user. "I think she was a drug user," said Nolan. Vergata was involved in a truck accident while pregnant with her older son, Gary, in the late 1980s. As a result of the accident, Gary, who is now 34 years old, was born with cerebral palsy.
According to public records, it is believed that Vergata may have filed a lawsuit against the trucking company on behalf of her then infant son, Gary, shortly after his birth. After giving birth to her younger son, Eric, in 1990, Vergata "took off after that," as remembered by Nolan. "She was a drug user and their father took her and helped her [for a time being]," Nolan said. Gary now lives in a care home for adults with special needs and is not yet aware of his mother's death, as mentioned by Nolan.
Eric and Gary's father Lind is believed to have died of tuberculosis, but the exact time of his death is not confirmed. 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, but her father, Dominic, filed to have her declared dead in 2017. Two months after her disappearance, her legs were found in a plastic bag at Davis Park on the bayside of Fire Island's Blue Point Beach. At that time, investigators could only determine that the victim was a White woman with several distinctive scars, including evidence of surgery on her left ankle, according to the Doe Network.
