CLEARFIELD – An SCI Houtzdale inmate connected with the Etan Patz murder case in New York City was in Clearfield County Court Thursday.
Jose Ramos, 73, has been ordered to New York City to testify in the case against Pedro Hernandez, who was charged with the boy’s murder after he allegedly confessed to investigators in 2012.
Etan was only 6 years old when he disappeared while walking two blocks to his bus stop in 1979, according to previous reports.
His disappearance became a national story and his face was one of the first featured as a missing child on a milk carton.
Officials never located his body, but he was declared legally dead in 2001. The day he went missing, May 25, is now known as National Missing Children’s Day.
During a short hearing Thursday, President Judge Fredric J. Ammerman signed an order permitting officials from New York to transport Ramos back to that state.
When he appeared in Clearfield County Court, Ramos said he wasn’t even aware of the situation. Previously, after he was transported to testify in this case in 2015, he was kept in New York for three months and never got into the courtroom, he said.
This was during the original trial for Hernandez in January of 2015 that ended in a hung jury because one juror couldn’t agree to convict Hernandez, according to a New York Times article.
Ramos has been a suspect in this murder because he had both the motive and opportunity. He was dating a woman hired to walk Etan home from school and is known to be a pedophile, the article said.
Ammerman asked Ramos how he got from New York City to Warren County, Pa., where Ramos was accused of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse in the late 1980’s. Ramos explained he was at a “rainbow gathering” when he “made some bad choice.” That victim was 8 years old. Ramos was given a 10 to 20-year sentence in that case in 1990.
According to an article from Newsday, Ramos had said he would invoke the Fifth Amendment if he were called to testify during the previous trial.
A former federal prosecutor testified in that trial that Ramos told him in 1988 that he was 90 percent sure a boy he picked up that same day was Etan. Ramos at that time stated that after the boy resisted having sex, he put him on a subway train to go to a relative’s home in Washington Heights. It was noted that the Patz family did not have a relative in that area.
In 2004 a civil ruling determined Ramos was the one responsible for Etan’s death and awarded Etan’s parents $2.7 million. This was reversed in August of 2016 because of Hernandez’s confession that he strangled the boy, according to the New York Post.
The new trial began earlier this week, according to the New York Times. They report that the prosecution is basing their case on Hernandez’s confession that was made to police after over six hours of interrogation. Investigators were alerted to Hernandez after his brother-in-law told them Hernandez had confessed to a prayer group that he had killed a boy.
At the time of Etan’s disappearance, Hernandez was working at a shop near the bus stop. Etan, who was walking alone to the bus stop for the first time, had planned to stop at this store to purchase soda that morning.
There is no physical evidence against Hernandez.
The defense is arguing that Hernandez was questioned without being read his rights. They describe him as having a low IQ, a personality disorder and claim he has hallucinations. They point to Ramos as the likely perpetrator of this crime.
Ramos is currently serving a six- to 20-year sentence in state prison for a Megan’s Law violation for giving officials a false address after his release on the other charge, he explained to Ammerman Thursday.