Judge Maxwell Wiley Declared a Mistrial in the Etan Patz Missing Child/Murder Case … Single Holdout Said He Could Not Vote to Convict Pedro Hernandez

JUDGE DECLARES MISTRIAL EVEN THOUGH SUSPECT HAD CONFESSED TO THE CRIME …

On Friday, the Judge Maxwell Wiley declared a mistrial in the Etan Patz missing child/murder trial as the jury after deliberating for three weeks could not reach a unanimous verdict. In the end, a lobe juror was the hold out as the jury was deadlocked, 11-1. The lone holdout juror, Adam C. Sirois, said to reporters following the trial, “Ultimately I couldn’t find enough evidence that was not circumstantial to convict. I couldn’t get there.” The lone juror, Juror #11, could not find it in himself to convict the kidnapping and murder suspect, Pedro Hernandez, who confessed to the murder? Etan Patz was the 6 year old boy who vanished while walking to a school bus stop in SoHo, NYC in 1979. His body has never been found.

A judge declared a mistrial in the Etan Patz case on Friday after jurors said for a third time that they could not reach a verdict despite three weeks of deliberation, leaving unresolved a missing-child case that vexed New York City for decades and led to a sea change in the way Americans view the security of their children.

After a four-month trial and 18 days of deliberation, the jury of seven men and five women said they were firmly deadlocked, 11 to 1, with a single holdout saying that he could not vote to convict Pedro Hernandez, 54, a disabled factory worker from New Jersey, of murder and kidnapping.

“Ultimately I couldn’t find enough evidence that was not circumstantial to convict,” the juror, Adam C. Sirois, told reporters during a news conference. “I couldn’t get there.”

Making it some what troubling for this mistrial and the decision by one lone juror not to convict Pedro Hernandez, who confessed to the murder. So what happens next? The mistrial leaves District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. with a difficult decision, to either pursue another costly trial with the same evidence that failed to convince the first jury or allow a man who confessed to murdering a child to go free.

51 year old Pedro Hernandez has confessed to the murder of then 6 year old Etan Patz. Pedro Hernandez of Maple Shade, NJ, has been arrested in the 1979 death and disappearance of Etan Patz. According to accounts, Hernandez admitted to luring the Etan into the store with candy, strangling him, and placing the body in a box. Hernandez stated that he put the box out with the trash and when he came back later, the box was gone.

A man has been arrested in the 1979 disappearance of a 6-year-old New York City boy. It’s the first arrest ever made in a case that helped give rise to the nation’s missing-children movement.

New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly says Pedro Hernandez of Maple Shade, N.J., has been arrested in the killing of Etan Patz (AY’-tahn payts). It’s not immediately clear whether Hernandez has a lawyer.

Kelly says Hernandez confessed to the crime. Hernandez worked at a convenience store near Etan’s Manhattan home. A law enforcement official says Hernandez told investigators this week he suffocated the boy and left his body in a box in an alley

Post Mistrial News Conference

Stanley Patz, the father of Etan, said following the judge declared a mistrial in the trial of his son’s murder, “We have come to the conclusion that Pedro Hernandez is guilty to crimes of which he has confessed beyond any reasonable doubt.” Mr. Patz stated following the mistrial that the family was very disappointed and frustrated that the jury was unable to come to a decision, “our long ordeal is not over”.