NEW YORK — Dozens of police and FBI investigators entered a Manhattan basement Thursday in a renewed search for evidence in the case of Etan Patz, the 6-year-old boy whose disappearance 33 years ago sparked a worldwide hunt, authorities said.
Three law enforcement officials said investigators had brought a cadaver-sniffing dog to the basement within the past few weeks and the dog had indicated the possibility of remains.
The building is less than a block from where Etan lived and is along the route he was to have traveled in May 1979, when he was allowed to walk to a school-bus stop by himself for the first time. Somewhere between his home and the bus stop, he disappeared.
Investigators believe that the basement, which housed a wood shop and art-storage space at the time of Etan’s disappearance, also was a known meeting place for sexual liaisons at the time.
Charges have never been brought in the Patz case, although police have long had a prime suspect: Jose A. Ramos, an acquaintance of a woman who baby-sat for the Patzes. Ramos is a convicted child molester serving time in Pennsylvania on another case.
Etan was one of the first missing children whose picture appeared on milk cartons, and his vanishing ushered in the modern era of permanently heightened alert about the dangers of letting children walk the streets alone.
The New York Times
