Related: Another Patzy?
They picked out the perfect one.
"Jury selection begins in 1979 child murder case" by James C. McKinley Jr., New York Times January 06, 2015
NEW YORK — Jury selection began Monday in the trial of a man accused of murdering 6-year-old Etan Patz, more than three decades after the boy’s disappearance helped launch a nationwide effort to find missing children.
Pedro Hernandez, 53, became a suspect less than three years ago in the 1979 case, which has long stymied prosecutors. Hernandez admitted killing Etan, but his defense lawyers say his confession is false and he wasn’t involved in the boy’s disappearance.
Etan’s case helped bring national urgency to finding missing children; his picture was one of the first printed on milk cartons to help alert the public. It was so influential that the anniversary of his disappearance became National Missing Children’s Day.
The boy’s body was never found, but he was legally declared dead as the investigation ground on.
About 100 prospective jurors filed into a state courtroom in Manhattan on Monday, where they were given a lengthy questionnaire to complete, including a list of 131 potential witnesses and others who will be mentioned during the trial.
A gasp went up from the jury pool when Justice Maxwell Wiley said the trial would last up to three months.
Wiley told the jurors he was aware that many of them had heard about the case, which has been in and out of the news since Etan disappeared on the way to his school bus stop on May 25, 1979.
“That doesn’t necessarily disqualify you from sitting on this case,” he said.
The judge said jurors would have to promise to set aside anything they had read or heard about Etan’s disappearance and decide the case solely on the testimony at trial.
“It’s something fair-minded people can do, despite publicity,” he said.
“For those of you who were born less than 35 years ago and know nothing about this case, don’t feel bad,” Wiley added. “But try to keep it that way.”
Hernandez sat quietly at the defense table. Rather than the orange prison jumpsuit he has worn at past court dates, he appeared in a striped dress shirt, a tie, and brown slacks. He smiled at jurors when Wiley introduced him and asked him to stand, but said nothing.
Hernandez, a former store clerk, was arrested in May 2012 after he admitted to detectives that he had lured Etan into the basement of a SoHo bodega, then strangled him for reasons he could not explain. “I wanted to let go, but I just couldn’t,” he told investigators.
Hernandez’s lawyer, Harvey Fishbein, has argued that the confession was false and coerced. He said he would prove that Hernandez has an extremely low intelligence score and other mental handicaps that make him suggestible and malleable.
The confession came after a six-hour interrogation during which the police inadvertently fed Hernandez details of the crime, Fishbein has argued.
The jury selection could take weeks, defense lawyers said. Prosecutors and defense attorneys will first sift through the questionnaires to make an initial cut, then potential jurors will be questioned in open court, starting next week. Opening statements are expected to begin Jan. 20.
After decades of dead-end police inquiries, a friend of Hernandez telephoned detectives in May 2012. The tipster said that during a prayer meeting in the early 1980s, Hernandez had talked about killing a child in New York. That call prompted detectives to bring in Hernandez and question him.
Hernandez, of Maple Shade, N.J., allegedly told police and prosecutors he had choked Etan and put the still-living boy into a plastic bag. He said he stuffed the bag in a box and dumped it on a street.
The public alarm caused by Etan’s case intensified with the kidnapping and killing of Florida 6-year-old Adam Walsh in 1981 and other child abductions in the 1980s and 1990s. Frightened parents stopped letting children walk alone to school and play unsupervised in their neighborhoods.
New laws established a national hot line and improved the sharing of information about missing children among law enforcement authorities.
Later, the Amber Alert system — named after 9-year-old Amber Hagerman, who was abducted and killed in Texas in 1996 — began relaying news of missing children through radio, television, and on billboards. Adam Walsh’s father, John, launched television’s ‘‘America’s Most Wanted.’’
Yet there were nearly 34,000 active missing child records nationwide at the start of this year, according to FBI statistics. Authorities cleared hundreds of thousands of other cases.
Good thing the authorities who cover up murderous elite pedophile rings are out looking for missing kids, huh?
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I'm not surprised the jewspaper dropped it.
Related: The Two Biggest Trials in Boston
SJC backs Hernandez on shielding cellphone
Jury instructions on eyewitness testimony updated
Hernandez jury pool asked if they’re Patriots fans
In Hernandez case, status of Bristol DA put in doubt
Because Baker rescinded Patrick's patronage. Blame him.
"Tsarnaev friend plans to plead guilty" by Milton J. Valencia, Globe Staff January 12, 2015
The Quincy cab driver who was a friend of the Tsarnaev brothers and who took both of the alleged Boston Marathon bombers out to dinner only hours after the deadly terror attack, said in court records Monday that he plans to plead guilty to destroying evidence related to the investigation.
Related: Tsarnaev's Took Taxi to Bomb Marathon
Khairullozhon Matanov, 24, filed the notice with the court in agreement with federal prosecutors just as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s trial is beginning in federal court in Boston, indicating he may be cooperating with authorities.
His lawyer, Paul M. Glickman, would not comment Monday night. He did not publicly state the terms of the agreement. But several of Tsarnaev’s other friends have also pleaded guilty to obstruction charges in advance of his trial under agreements that they will cooperate with authorities investigating the April 15, 2013, bombings, in exchange for lighter penalties.
After the government threatened (if not tortured) them during detention.
Matanov, who has been held without bail since his arrest last May, had been scheduled to go to trial in June on charges that he destroyed evidence related to the bombings by deleting his Internet search history from his computer. He also allegedly tried to dispose of cellphones, and lied about details of his encounters with Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev in the hours and days after the bombings.
According to court records, he took the brothers out to a restaurant in Cambridge on the night of the explosions, although he told authorities he knew nothing of their involvement. He said he only realized they set off the two bombs after their photos were released to the public.
Authorities said that he then allegedly deleted his Internet search history and other materials, interfering with their investigation, even though he realized investigators might have an interest in the information. Authorities had tracked Matanov for several months before he was arrested.
Matanov has not been charged with taking part in the bombings.
He has told authorities that he met Tamerlan at a Cambridge mosque several years before the attacks that killed three people and injured more than 260.
Assistant US Attorney Scott Garland has said that Matanov faces 15 years in prison under sentencing guidelines.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, now 21, faces multiple charges that carry the possibility of the death penalty, for allegedly setting off the bombs at the Marathon.
He and his older brother and alleged accomplice, Tamerlan, also allegedly shot and killed an MIT police officer before attempting to flee the area. Tamerlan, 26, was killed in a confrontation with police.
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s trial began last week with the initial stages of jury selection, and more than 1,350 potential jurors in several groups filled out surveys that could help determine whether they are suitable to serve. On Monday, lawyers agreed to immediately exclude 124 jurors.
Several of Tsarnaev’s friends have already been convicted in federal court, though none took part in the bombings.
Two of his college friends at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth were convicted last summer of destroying evidence, after they removed a backpack containing fireworks from his dorm room.
One of them pleaded guilty and agreed to serve seven years in prison in exchange for his cooperation against Tsarnaev.
A third friend was convicted in October of lying to authorities about seeing the other two friends take the backpack from the dorm room.
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Also see: Tsarnaev friend to plead guilty
I feel sorry for the kid because the heavy hand of government was brought to bear: either sign this statement confirming our version of events, or be a Todashev.
"Lawyers for alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev asked a federal judge Tuesday to suspend juror selections in the case, citing the potential for the jury pool to be prejudiced by the recent terror attacks in France. The attacks in Paris last week left 17 people dead and had similarities to the bombings two years ago in Boston: They were allegedly set off by two brothers, claiming vengeance for fellow Muslims, and they sent a region into days of terror. Prosecutors did not immediately respond to the request. The questioning of potential jurors is set for Thursday."
Related: The Pre-Trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
NDU: Tsarnaev judge denies latest request for trial delay
