NEW YORK (AP) – The daughter of a man on trial for murder in the 1979 disappearance of 6-year-old Etan Patz testified Monday about her strict upbringing and the effect her father’s arrest had on her.
Becky Hernandez, 25, speaking publicly for the first time about the case against her father, Pedro Hernandez, said she wasn’t allowed out with friends as a youngster – and her father held her hand crossing the street until she was 14.
Hernandez said stress over the case prevented her from getting a master’s degree.
The defendant had no visible reaction as his daughter testified. He did turn around to wave and smile at his wife, who was sitting in the benches.
Pedro Hernandez confessed in 2012 to choking Etan in the basement of a convenience store where he worked. His attorneys say the confession is the fictional raving of a mentally ill man.