BREAKING NEWS

Suspect convicted in 1979 murder of 6-year-old Jewish boy in New York

By JTA

FEBRUARY 15, 2017 10:32

After two trials and thousands of milk cartons featuring the picture of Etan Patz, a suspect in the 1979 kidnapping and murder of the 6-year-old boy has been convicted.

A New York State Supreme Court jury in Manhattan found Pedro Hernandez, 56, of New Jersey, guilty on Tuesday after deliberating for nine days.

Hernandez’s attorney, Harvey Fishbein, said he would appeal, saying there are “numerous grounds.” Hernandez was tried on murder charges last year, but a Manhattan jury could not reach a verdict after 18 days.

Etan, who was Jewish, was one of the first missing children to be featured on the side of milk cartons. He disappeared in May 1979 while walking to his school bus stop two blocks from his home in the downtown SoHo section of New York for the first time by himself. Hernandez, then 18, worked nearby at a grocery store.

Hernandez was arrested based on a tip from a brother-in-law. He confessed in 2012 to having strangled Etan in the basement of the grocery store after luring him there with a soda, then putting the boy’s body in a box, which he left in an alley.

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