N.Y.C. police dig up Levi Aron's backyard
Police carted off bags of evidence from the residence of accused killer Levi Aron Friday, and left the backyard of his Brooklyn home riddled with shallow holes, CBS Station WCBS reports.
Aron is a suspect in the murder-dismemberment of an 8-year-old boy who was abducted off a Brooklyn street and whose remains were later found in Aron's house.
The home is expected to remain under police guard for the foreseeable future as a Brooklyn grand jury prepares a murder indictment that could be issued sometime next week, WCBS reports.
Aron, who pleaded not guilty Thursday, is accused of kidnapping, killing and dismembering the boy who asked him for directions. Prosecutors allege he lured Leiby Kletzky to his home Monday after the little boy got lost while walking home from a day camp.
Investigators are looking into whether the suspect had any improper contact with children in the past, the prosecutor said.
They've also have been examining three computers seized from his home.
A judge ordered Aron to undergo a psychological evaluation; he's also under a suicide watch.
"He has indicated to me that he hears voices and has had some hallucinations," said defense attorney Pierre Bazile.
Suspect in NYC boy's murder "hears voices"
N.Y.C. boy likely tied up, fought back before death
Video cameras captured the fateful encounter between the two on a Brooklyn street as Leiby's mother waited anxiously just a few blocks away. Detectives later found the boy's severed feet, wrapped in plastic, in the man's freezer, as well as a cutting board and three bloody carving knives.
Police and prosecutors said Aron, a clerk at a hardware supply store, has confessed to suffocating the boy with a bath towel, but they continued to work on verifying his horrific and bizarre explanation for the boy's death.
At the Kletzky household, his family also looked for answers, too.
"Why?" asked Shmuel Eckstein, a family friend, as the boy's parents and five sisters sat and prayed. "...What we know is that through Leiby's death, God is sending us a huge signal — that we're doing something terribly wrong. And we're looking for what it is."
"We're not into revenge," he added.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Aron told investigators that he brought the child to a suburban wedding about 35 miles away and spent several hours there. Other wedding guests confirmed Aron was there but didn't see the boy. Izzy Goldstein, manager of Ateres Charna, said police had downloaded security video from the event hall's closed-circuit cameras.
By the time the pair returned to the city, it was so late that Aron decided to take Leiby to his home to sleep and left him there Tuesday while he went to work, according to the police version of the confession. Kelly said the store confirmed that Aron showed up as usual that day.
Aron told police he killed Leiby when he got home after being spooked by a massive search for the boy in Borough Park section of Brooklyn, home to one of the world's largest communities of Orthodox Jews outside of Israel.
"When I saw the fliers, I panicked and was afraid," Aron said, according to police.
Investigators have said Leiby may have been tied up and tried to fight back. Kelly said Aron had scratches on his arms, wrists and elsewhere — a sign "there was some kind of struggle." There also were marks on the boy's remains that could have been caused by restraints, the commissioner added.
A preliminary medical examination indicates Leiby was "smothered or suffocated." The medical examiner said further study was required.