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Pedro Hernandez, a former Manhattan stock clerk who once lived in the same neighborhood as Etan Patz, was arrested Thursday in connection with his murder, more than three decades after the 6-year-old went missing.
Hernandez allegedly lured Patz to the store with the promise of a soda, choked him in the basement and then disposed of the body using a plastic bag, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly told reporters.
Authorities were tipped off to Hernandez by someone who knew him, and whom Hernandez had confided in, a law enforcement source said.
The boy's disappearance exactly 33 years ago on Friday helped spawn a national movement to raise awareness of missing children, which involved a then-novel approach of splashing an image of the child's face across thousands of milk cartons.
In her book detailing the investigation, author Lisa Cohen describes the plan Etan had the day he went missing. Just prior to his disappearance, according to the book, Patz told his parents that he planned to stop at a store to buy a soda with a dollar that he'd earned by helping a neighborhood carpenter. It's not clear which store he meant.
Source: CNN