Levi Aron Pleads Guilty To Fatal Kidnapping Of Brooklyn Boy
A Brooklyn man pleaded guilty Thursday afternoon to
abducting and murdering 8-year-old Leiby Kletzy, agreeing to a plea deal in
exchange for a sentence of 40 years to life in prison.
In a largely empty proceeding in a ceremonial courtroom
at the State Supreme Courthouse in Brooklyn, Levi Aron, 36 years old, admitted
to the crime.
Wearing an orange jumpsuit, yarmulke and with his hands
cuffed behind his back, Aron gave faint answers that at times had to be
repeated, explaining how he abducted Leiby, killed him, chopped up his body and
“took it to a dumpster.”
“I put it in the suitcase,” he said of the boy’s body.
The plea before Judge Neil Firetog brings an end to a
case that shocked a tight-knit orthodox Jewish community in which both Aron and
Leiby were members, but unknown to each other. He will be sentenced at a later
date.
The boy’s parents — who were not at Thursday’s
proceedings – and prosecutors had sought
to avoid a trial in hopes of not having to relive the horrific events that led
to Leiby’s body being dismembered. After the plea, State Sen. Dov Hikind read a
strongly worded statement on that family’s behalf, in which they said they have
“finally received some partial closure.”
Aron, who defense attorneys claimed is mentally
disturbed, was found fit to stand trial earlier this year, setting up the
possibility of a plea deal.
News leaked last week that the two sides had reached a
tentative deal in which Aron would plead guilty and received a sentence of 40
years to life in prison.
On Thursday, Aron admitted to abducting Leiby off the
street in the Borough Park section of Brooklyn on July 11, 2011, as the boy was
walking home from a summer camp not far from his home, officials have said.
Aron said he first drove Leiby to a relative’s wedding in
upstate Monsey, N.Y., where the child stayed in a car outside.
In a written confession, Aron has told police he then
held Leiby captive in his cramped attic apartment for the night and became
unnerved when he saw there was an extensive search under way for the missing
boy.
Aron has told police that he and the child slept in
separate rooms of his home in the Kensington section of Brooklyn. After
returning home from work at a hardware store the next day, Aron told
authorities he fed the boy a tuna fish sandwich before giving him a cocktail of
muscle relaxants and pain killers. Police say he then smothered Leiby with a
towel and dismembered him.
Police were led to Aron through surveillance footage
showing Leiby getting into his car. When officers arrived at his apartment,
they found a cutting board and bloody carving knives in his refrigerator.
Some of the boy’s remains were found in the freezer,
and Aron led detectives to the rest, which
were found wrapped in a black plastic garbage bag, placed inside a red suitcase
and dropped in a Dumpster in Sunset Park, about two miles from Aron’s
apartment.
The case has drawn international attention. Local leaders
say that in the year since Leiby’s death, the Kletzky family has received more
than 200,000 letters of condolence from around the world.
When Aron was charged, Brooklyn District Attorney Charles
Hynes had vowed a swift end to the case. Attorney for Aron had weighed bringing
an insanity defense.
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