BY LINCOLN ANDERSON | Prosecutors from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office this past Monday released evidence photos in the trial of Pedro Hernandez, who is accused of killing Etan Patz in Soho in 1979.
The photos “set the scene” as it appeared back then when the six-year-old went missing on the first day that he went to school on his own. At that time, the area was a gritty and desolate artists’ enclave — a far cry from today’s tourist-infested shopping mall.
Hernandez was arrested in 2012 after a relative tipped off police that Hernandez had mentioned once killing a child in Soho. Hernandez eventually confessed to police that he had done it. Other relatives and members of Hernandez’s church group also told authorities that Hernandez had mentioned the alleged murder to them.
However, his defense team argues that his confession was coerced and that he is mentally ill and intellectually disabled with a very low IQ of 70.
One photo released by the D.A. showed the northwest corner of Prince St. and West Broadway, where the bodega that Hernandez worked in was then located. A mime is seen messing with a motorist in a performance-art piece that was intended to call attention to the young boy’s disappearance.
In his confession, the defendant said he lured Patz into the basement with the promise of a soda, then strangled him. However, those whom he later confessed his alleged crime to, tell conflicting stories of what he said happened and how he allegedly killed Patz. One friend, for example, said Hernandez told him Patz “threw a ball at his throat,” angering the bodega worker, after which he throttled him.
In more conflicting testimony, a bodega co-worker from back then stated Hernandez couldn’t have been in the store’s basement that morning since the stairs that led down to it — accessible from outside on the sidewalk — would have been gated at that hour. Plus, he said, Hernandez would have been helping with the breakfast rush at that hour.
Today, the corner is occupied by Michal Negrin, an Israeli clothing and jewelry boutique that was formerly located on Spring St.
Julie Patz, Etan’s mom, only came on the trial’s first day to testify, and said she wouldn’t attend anymore because it was too painful to hear what allegedly had been done to her son by the defendant.
However, Etan’s father and sister, Stanley Patz and Shira Patz, the latter who uses a motorized wheelchair, have been at the trial every day.
