Patz vanished in 1979, as he walked alone for the first time to a school bus stop in the Soho neighborhood of Manhattan, and was never found. The boy became one of the first missing children whose faces would become ubiquitous as emblems printed on the sides of milk cartons to publicize their disappearance in hopes of generating investigative tips.<\/p>\n
Police arrested Hernandez in 2012 after getting a tip that he had confessed to the crime at a church group decades earlier. Hernandez then confessed to police that he lured Patz to the basement of the Soho deli where he worked, strangled him, and dumped his body in an alley.<\/p>\n
\t Hernandez\u2019s defense attorneys argued that Hernandez was mentally ill and his confession was coerced by the police.<\/p>\n The defense also sought to blame the murder on Jose Ramos, who dated a Patz family babysitter and was long considered the prime suspect. Ramos, who died in March of this year, served a lengthy prison term after being convicted of sexually abusing boys.<\/p>\n Hernandez, now in his mid-60s, was first tried in 2015. That jury was unable to reach a verdict<\/a> because of a lone holdout juror who had doubts about the defendant\u2019s guilt. At his second trial, two years later, Hernandez was found guilty of kidnapping and murdering Patz, and was sentenced to a prison term of 25 years to life.<\/p>\n But the Manhattan-based 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Hernandez\u2019s conviction<\/a> in 2025, ruling that the trial judge had incorrectly instructed the jury and thus swayed the verdict against the defendant.<\/p>\n The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that the 2nd Circuit\u2019s action violated a 1996 federal law that places limits on the power of federal courts to grant relief to prisoners convicted in state courts.<\/p>\n \t Hernandez initially admitted to the crime without being advised of his so-called Miranda rights to avoid self-incrimination and to have an attorney present. Then, after Hernandez was read his rights and had agreed to waive them, he was videotaped twice making statements of confession.<\/p>\n On the second day of deliberations in the 2017 trial, the jury sent a note to Justice Maxwell Wiley, the judge in the case, asking whether jurors must disregard the two videotaped confessions if they concluded that the initial, non-Mirandized one was involuntary.<\/p>\n The judge wrote back: \u201cThe answer is no,\u201d which the 2nd Circuit ruled was improper and \u201cmanifestly prejudicial.\u201d<\/p>\n The anniversary of Patz\u2019s disappearance, May 25, is still commemorated as National Missing Children\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t The war with Iran has been draining for all of us in Israel. But when I heard about a high casualty incident \u2013 ballistic missile impacts in Arad and Dimona that left nearly 200 people wounded \u2013 I drank a cup of coffee, packed a bag, and headed south.<\/p>\n There, I spoke with Shilgit, the head of an after-school program for underprivileged youth. Standing outside her destroyed center, Shilgit said it was a miracle that no children were hurt and spoke about the community coming together in the hours since.<\/p>\n As a Times of Israel reporter, I\u2019m committed to telling stories of resilience like Shilgit\u2019s. But my colleagues and I can’t do this alone. If you value work like this, please consider joining our reader support group, The Times of Israel Community. Your financial support is essential to keep real human reporting like this going.<\/p>\n \u2014 Stav Levaton, military reporter<\/p>\n \t\t\t
\t\t\t
\t\t\tAlready a member? Sign in to stop seeing this<\/a><\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t That\u2019s why we started the Times of Israel – to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.<\/p>\n So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven\u2019t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.<\/p>\n For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.<\/p>\n Thank you, \t\t\t
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Missing-NYC-Boy_Horo-640x400.jpg\")
<\/a>
\n\t\tA flyer distributed by the New York Police Department of Etan Patz, who vanished in New York on May 25, 1979. (courtesy NYPD\/AP)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Missing-NYC-Boy_Horo-e1431134924872-640x400.jpg\")
<\/a>
\n\t\tThis May 28, 2012 file photo shows a newspaper with a photograph of Etan Patz at a makeshift memorial in the SoHo neighborhood of New York, where Patz lived before his disappearance on May 25, 1979. (AP\/Mark Lennihan)<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tWe can’t do this work alone.\t\t\t<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Untitled-design-4-200x200.jpg\" "\\"\\"\/")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tYes, I’ll join\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tYes, I’ll join\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tYou’re a dedicated reader\t\t\t<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/334x334-200x200.png\" "\\"\\"\/")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\tJoin Our Community\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n