Etan Patz (Stanley Patz)
Pedro Hernandez (AP)
The man who confessed to killing Etan Patz kept a photo of the boy among his personal possessions for years after the murder, his ex-wife told investigators.
Pedro Hernandez’ ex-wife Daisy Rivera said she found the picture, which appeared to be cut from one of the missing persons posters that blanketed the city in 1979, in a “box of his personal papers” that he kept in their New Jersey home, a law enforcement source told The Post.
“She brought up that once she was going through a box of his with personal papers and inside that box was the picture of Patz,” the source said. “She said it looked like it came from a missing poster that was put up in the neighborhood.
When confronted with the photo, an angry Hernandez freaked out, Rivera told cops.
“She asked ‘What is this?’ He said ‘What are you doing? Put that away! Don’t go through my stuff!” the source said.
Cops got a search warrant for the Maple Shade, New Jersey house where Hernandez was living with his second wife and daughter – but came up empty.
“One of the things they were looking for when they got a search warrant for the house was this picture or this box but they didn’t find it so they’ll have to use her testimony” if there’s a trial, the source said.
Hernandez confessed to murdering the 6-year-old Patz 33 years after the boy disappeared while walking to a school bus stop.
He was charged with second-degree murder after telling cops he lured the innocent child “with the promise of a soda, and led him to the basement of the bodega, and strangled him there,” Police Commissioner Ray Kelly at the time.
Hernandez placed Etan’s body in a bag and left it in a freezer before taking it to another location in the neighborhood and dumping it with the trash.
He gave cops no explanation for the killing other than that he had “an urge” to snatch and kill the boy.