Stanley Patz sends a copy of his son Etan’s missing child poster to prisoner Jose Ramos each year on his son’s birthday and date of disappearance. On the back, he writes a chilling message that reads, “What did you do to my little boy?”
Etan was 6 years old when he was kidnapped on the way to a bus stop in Manhattan in 1979. He was officially declared deceased in 2001. The suspect after all these years is a drifter named Jose Ramos who is currently imprisoned for abusing an 8-year-old boy in Pennsylvania. He was never found guilty of Etan’s death but was held responsible in a wrongful-death lawsuit. Recently, investigators have been ripping up Manhattan handyman Othniel Miller’s basement because they believe the 75-year-old may have in fact had involvement in Etan’s death. Miller was a friend of the Patz family at the time of Etan’s disappearance, and his basement was in a building on the way to Etan’s bus stop.
This investigation incites a judicial nightmare, with one man being held responsible for Etan’s death in civil court and the other becoming the primary focus of a renewed criminal case. Ramos is a convicted child molester who admitted to direct involvement in Etan’s disappearance while imprisoned in 1991. It is possible that if this new investigation yields a suspect, the court may reevaluate the initial outcome of Ramos’ wrongful death suit.
It makes sense that the American justice system wants to find the person responsible for this atrocity. But after decades of searching, I don’t understand how authorities believe this will benefit Etan’s family. Each and every year, they have to relive the loss of a child. And if they can sleep at night, it is likely due in part to knowing or at least believing that the man responsible is behind bars. If Miller was indeed involved in Etan’s death, all that means is a murderer has been allowed to walk free for the past 30-plus years.
The Patz family clearly doesn’t want to pour salt in open wounds by talking to the national press about the developing situation. They placed a note on their door informing reporters not to even bother.
It’s not permissible to say “let sleeping dogs lie” in this situation. However, the human psyche dictates that justice is served when consequences are dealt for aberrant behavior, which is exactly what has happened with Ramos. He will not be tried again in accordance with double jeopardy, and he is set for release in November. So in the event that evidence emerges confirming Miller as Etan’s murderer, all that will happen is that he will take the place of Ramos in jail. It won’t vindicate Ramos or bring peace of mind to the Patz family.
Life doesn’t move on after the murder of a child. But for the Patz family, the cost of bringing this tragedy back to the national forefront may not be outweighed by the benefit of finding a potential culprit. Rectifying a misstep in the execution of the justice system will not bring Etan back.
Admitting that the justice system fails us sometimes is equally difficult. But one must still turn over rocks with caution. If Ramos is no longer found liable for Etan’s death, and Miller gets convicted of some sort of involvement, the justice system is merely making villains of itself and Miller. While it seems like a stretch to assume that anything groundbreaking would be discovered in Miller’s basement, the implications of that result trouble the water for both the Patz family and the perception of the American justice system.
Gideon Resnick is a Medill freshman. He can be reached at gideonresnick2015@u.
