Who was to Etan Patz? What to know about The first child on the Milk carton’s disappearance amid overturned conviction

The disappearance of Etan Patz in 1979 is one of the most famous unsolved cases in American history. Decades after his disappearance, the man who was convicted of his murder, Pedro Hernandez, has had his conviction denied by a federal appeals court and now faces the prospect of a new trial.

On May 25, 1979, Etan Patz, a six-year-old kid, was reported as missing from his Manhattan apartment when he had walked out by himself to the corner school bus stop for the first time in his life. What followed was a massive manhunt in New York City and beyond, but Etan’s body was never located.

The case gripped the nation and altered how America reacted to the abduction of its children. According to the Associated Press, Etan’s image was one of the first to appear on milk cartons as part of a now iconic campaign that sought to raise public awareness.

In 1979, 6-year-old Etan Patz vanished on his way to the bus stop in New York City. He became the first missing child to appear on a milk carton. The case stayed cold for decades. His killer wasn’t caught until 2012. pic.twitter.com/e8B5pFEFCM

— Fascinating (@fasc1nate) July 16, 2025

His parents, Stan and Julie Patz, became significant advocates for missing children and were instrumental in the development of a national hotline and in efforts to improve the sharing of information between law enforcement agencies.

In 1983, President Ronald Reagan declared May 25 as the National Missing Children’s Day, in honor of Etan. The decades-long mystery of Etan’s disappearance had no clear answers. In 2001, he was declared legally dead.

The case was reopened in 2012 when the police got a tip about Pedro Hernandez, a former stock clerk at a convenience store in Etan’s neighborhood at the time he went missing. Hernandez had previously told a relative years ago that he had hurt a child in New York.

A look into Pedro Hernandez's link to Etan Patz's death and the recent overturn of conviction

Following hours of questioning, Hernandez admitted to enticing Etan into the store’s basement with the promise of a soda, choking him, and throwing his body in a box. But there was no material evidence linking him to the crime.

According to Time, Pedro Hernandez’s attorneys contended that his confession had been coerced and was false, given his mental illness, low IQ and group suggestibility. The first trial, in 2015, ended in a hung jury.

Hernandez was convicted of murder and kidnapping by a second jury in 2017 and sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. On July 21, 2025, a federal appeals court overturned his conviction, finding errors in the instructions given to the jury by the trial judge concerning his confessions.

Another murderer to be released post his 2017 conviction for murdering 6 YO Etan Patz (if not retried). Etan's killer confessed many times, by the way.

So what happened. The jury asked the judge during trial if they needed to disregard the confession his killer made pre-Miranda… pic.twitter.com/7zXiNJMrUA

— Jennifer Coffindaffer (@CoffindafferFBI) July 22, 2025

According to reports, the jury did not necessarily understand that if they thought the initial, pre-Miranda confession was tainted, they could ignore all of Hernandez’s statements.

Pedro Hernandez, who is now 64, will be freed unless prosecutors initiate a new trial within a reasonable period of time. The office of the Manhattan district attorney is reviewing the ruling.

Etan Patz’s disappearance not only transformed the trajectory of his family’s life, it also altered America’s conception of how to protect children. The milk carton campaign, databases of the missing, and awareness days were born thanks to this case.