Leiby Kletzky died fighting for life

New details in the murder case of eight-year-old Leiby Kletzky have found that the boy may have tried to fight off his captor before he was killed.

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said the attacker Levi 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 indicated Leiby was "smothered or suffocated," but it remained unclear when that happened.

The 35-year-old has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder and kidnapping. Prosecutors said Aron lured Leiby Kletzky to his home on Monday after the boy while walking home from an Orthodox Jewish day camp.

Video cameras captured the encounter between the two on a Brooklyn street, while 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.

Aron, who appeared pale and confused, was held without bail and placed on suicide watch in protective custody.

Police and prosecutors said Aron, a clerk at a hardware supply store, had confessed to suffocating the boy with a bath towel, but they continued trying to verify his horrific and bizarre explanation for the boy's death.

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Aron told investigators that after taking Leiby off the street on Monday, he took the boy to a wedding in the suburbs and spent several hours there.

Other wedding guests confirmed Aron was there but didn't see the boy, the commissioner added.

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 on Tuesday while he went to work, according to the police version of the confession. Kelly said the hardware supply 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.

In his confession, Aron recounted how he dismembered the boy, put some of the body parts in a freezer and took a shower, police said. He then put some remains in a suitcase and drove around with it for 20 minutes before putting the suitcase in a rubbish bin.

Thousands of volunteers from the Hasidic community had assembled on Monday evening to comb the streets, and the entire neighbourhood was in a frenzy on Tuesday over the lost child.

These same people turned out on Wednesday night to mourn the young boy and pay their respects at his funeral.

Blocks away from the Borough Park, the streets were crowded with mourners who cried as though the boy was their own.

"It's as if we all lost a child," said Esther, who chose not to give her last name.

Officials said the killing stood out because there was no clear motive.
"It defies all logic and I think that's what's been so terribly disturbing."