Kriti Mehrotra
It was in May 2010 when sex worker Shannan Gilbert suddenly fled a client’s Oak Beach home and made a 23-minute 911 to assert she was in danger, only to disappear without a trace left behind. However, as carefully chronicled in ABC’s ‘Truth and Lies: The Hunted,’ neither her client nor her driver — reportedly the only two individuals near her around that time — posed any threat to her.
Her whole situation was thus mysterious to say the least, but no one could have ever imagined its ensuing investigations would inadvertently result in the Gilgo Beach Serial Killings being uncovered. Yet if we’re being honest, the one individual to have been impacted the most by this ordeal was her boyfriend at the time, Alex Diaz, especially considering the circumstances arond the matter.
Who is Alex Diaz?
Although Ellensville, New York native Shannan was an aspiring singer, her desire for comfortable financial freedom won over when she was around 20 and drove her to trade waitressing for escorting. She actually even relocated to New Jersey after a while and began working with a service called Lace Party Girls, which is where she first came across local Alex Diaz — he served as a driver there.
The truth is Shannan and Alex almost immediately clicked, so they got to know one another a little better before getting into a full-blown serious yet extremely tumultuous relationship. We say “extremely tumultuous” because they had more than their fair share of ups and downs, especially following the police sting turned shutdown of their employer escort service in the late 2000s. That’s because while the former subsequently had to begin finding clients independently through Backpage or Craigslist, the latter quit driving, making finances, stress, plus jealousy their issues.
According to reports, Shannan and Alex would sometimes fight to such an extent things would turn physical, just for it to once even result in him shattering her jaw with a hard, closed-fist punch. Nevertheless, upon receiving treatment at a hospital to repair her bone through a tight metal plate as well as his apologies, she returned to their shared home because that’s how in love they were. In fact, the spring of 2010 was a good period for the couple, and on the evening of April 30, they actually giddily snuck Taco Bell into the theatre where they’d watch ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street.’
Things were apparently perfectly normal as Shannan and Alex returned home too, where the former later began getting ready for work — she’d found a client all the way in Oak Beach, Long Island. This 24-year-old left with a trusted driver named Michael Pak near midnight, and that’s the last time her long-term live-in boyfriend (two years her older) ever saw or heard from her alive. He admittedly waited a long time for her to come back before wondering whether she’d finally left him for good, leading him to contact her entire family on May 3 to see if she’d gone to see them.
Alex then grew really worried and reached out to Michael too, which is when he learned Shannan had broken down, fled, and refused to get in the car, meaning she likely never made it off the island. These two men hence made their way to Oak Beach in search of her, going as far as to check local beaches as well as hospitals for any sign prior to filing an official missing person’s report. They initially tried to do so in Suffolk County itself but were vehemently told it had to be done in her base of Jersey City, unaware the ensuing hunt for her would uncover the Gilgo Beach killings.
Where is Alex Diaz Now?
It was really hard for Alex to not know what’d happened to his girlfriend as months passed, especially as he couldn’t even comprehend whether to believe she was still alive or had long passed away. The discovery of at least ten other bodies didn’t help either, so once it was hers that was found on December 13, 2014, and then positively identified, he candidly said he could maybe finally move on.
From what we can tell, Alex seemingly still resides in his hometown of Jersey City, where he’s doing his best to move on from the past while preferring to keep his recent experiences well away from the limelight. Though we do know he’s a little glad that at least Shannan’s accidental death (contested) was not in vain since it brought to light the fact Long Island had a heinous serial killer on the loose.
Read More: Where is the Alleged Long Island Serial Killer Rex Heuermann Now?
