Prosecutors will retry man in death of Etan Patz, whose 1979
disappearance spotlighted missing kids
[November 26, 2025]
By JENNIFER PELTZ
NEW YORK (AP) — A notorious 1979 missing-child case is headed to trial a
third time after New York prosecutors vowed Tuesday to retry the man
whose murder conviction was recently overturned in the disappearance of
6-year-old Etan Patz.
In a case that has long been gnarled by time and uncertainty, a new set
of prosecutors now will need to bring back witnesses, elicit memories
and try to persuade another jury that Pedro Hernandez lured and killed
the boy as he walked to his school bus stop in New York City.
“After thorough review, the district attorney has determined that the
available, admissible evidence supports prosecuting” Hernandez on murder
and kidnapping charges, Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Sarah
Marquez wrote, adding that prosecutors “are prepared to proceed.”
Hernandez’s lawyers said they were deeply disappointed by prosecutors'
decision.
"We remain convinced that Mr. Hernandez is an innocent man. But we will
be prepared for trial and will present an even stronger defense,”
attorneys Harvey Fishbein and Alice Fontier said in a statement.
Hernandez is due in court Monday for a discussion of next steps. Under
federal court rulings, jury selection for his retrial must begin by June
1, or he must be released from prison.
Etan’s father, Stan Patz, declined to comment when reached by phone
Tuesday. He had hailed Hernandez' now-overturned conviction as “some
measure of justice for our wonderful little boy, Etan.”
Hernandez, now 64, worked at a nearby corner store when Etan disappeared
on May 25, 1979. It was the first day his mother let him make the
roughly block-long trip to the bus stop by himself. The first-grader's
body was never found, but he was legally declared dead in 2001, at his
family's request.
His case fueled a national focus on child disappearances and abductions.
Etan was one of the first to appear on milk cartons, and his parents
helped successfully advocate for a national hotline and other steps to
help report and rescue vanished youngsters. The anniversary of Etan's
disappearance became National Missing Children's Day.
The case affected parenting, as well as policing, contributing to a
cultural shift toward tighter supervision of American kids.
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A photograph of Etan Patz hangs on an angel figurine, as part of a
makeshift memorial in the SoHo neighborhood of New York, May 28,
2012. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)
Hernandez didn't become a suspect until decades later, when
authorities learned that he had made various, somewhat inconsistent
statements to confidants over the years about having killed a child
or person in New York.
Hernandez then told police in 2012 he had strangled Etan after
offering him a soda and enticing him into the store basement.
“Something just took over me,” Hernandez told authorities on video.
With no physical evidence, the confession was crucial. His lawyers
said it was delusional, false and made under pressure from police
bent on closing a decades-old case.
Hernandez had been diagnosed with a mental disorder, has a very low
IQ and was on antipsychotic medication. Police questioned him for
about seven hours without reading him his rights or recording the
interaction — those steps were taken only after, according to
police, he implicated himself for the first time.
Hernandez's first trial ended in a hung jury, because of one
member's misgivings about the defendant's mental health and
hourslong police questioning. Hernandez was convicted at a 2017
retrial and was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.
A federal appeals court ruled in July that his conviction was
tainted by a judge's “clearly wrong” response to a 2017 jury
question about Hernandez's confessions.
The question was whether jurors had to disregard Hernandez's
recorded confessions if they concluded the first, unrecorded
admissions were coerced. The jury was told the answer was simply
“no.”
It should have been “maybe,” with an explanation of options and
legal principles for assessing such situations, the appeals judges
said. They ordered his release unless his retrial begins “within a
reasonable period,” leaving a lower court judge to specify how long.
She then set the deadline at June 1.
___
Associated Press writer Philip Marcelo contributed.
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