NEW YORK (AP) – The man suspected of killing a 6-year-old boy in one of New York City’s most notorious missing children’s cases bursts into tears during a videotaped confession as detectives hug and comfort him, assuring him that he did the right thing by coming forward.
The video played Thursday in Manhattan state Supreme Court was the first taped confession by Pedro Hernandez, arrested in May 2012 for the killing of Etan Patz who disappeared May 25, 1979. But it is the second tape viewed by Judge Maxwell Wiley, who must decide whether the confessions will be used as evidence in Hernandez’ upcoming murder trial – not whether the admissions are true. A third video of Hernandez showing detectives where he said he dumped the boy’s body was also expected to be shown.
Etan vanished while walking to a bus stop on the first day he was allowed to walk to school alone. His body has never been found. The day he disappeared became National Missing Children’s Day.
Hernandez has pleaded not guilty and his attorney Harvey Fishbein says the confessions are false; Hernandez has a history of mental illness and an IQ bordering on intellectual disability.
The 53-year-old suspect is more emotional in the confession shown Thursday than the previous video, while describing in nearly identical words how he choked Etan, put the boy alive into a plastic bag, put the bag in a box and left it about two blocks away. He said he went back the next day but the box was gone.