Source: NY suspect said he suffocated boy

The suspect in the killing of a Brooklyn 8-year-old told investigators that he suffocated the child before a massive search led to the discovery of his dismembered remains.

A law enforcement official told The Associated Press that the information is part of a confession by Levi Aron, 35. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the investigation has not been completed.

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The official said Aron also told investigators he took the child to a wedding in upstate New York. Investigators say they don't know whether that is true.

Thousands of mourners gathered Wednesday night at the funeral for the boy, Leiby Kletzky. He disappeared Monday after getting lost on a short walk home from day camp.

The funeral came just hours after police discovered the boy's remains, and arrested Aron, who told them he had taken the boy home after he asked for directions.

'I panicked'

According to a partial transcript of a written confession posted on the website of NBC New York, Aron told investigators he took the boy to a wedding in the suburb of Monsey. He said he didn't realize that a small army of volunteers was out searching until the next morning.

"When I saw the flyers I panicked and was afraid," he reportedly wrote on a legal pad during a police interview. NBC said it had obtained a transcript of Aron's handwritten notes from "a law enforcement source."

Detectives 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. A plastic garbage bag with bloody towels was nearby.

"It is every parent's worst nightmare," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Wednesday, following the arrest.

Aron was awaiting arraignment Thursday on a charge of second degree murder.

Leiby disappeared Monday afternoon while on his way to meet his mother on a street corner seven blocks from his day camp, the first time the young Hasidic child was allowed to walk the route alone. Authorities said he had evidently gotten lost after missing a turn, and had reached out to Aron, a stranger, for help.

The break in the case came when investigators watched a grainy video that showed the boy, wearing his backpack, getting into a car with a man outside a dentist's office. Detectives tracked the dentist down at his home in New Jersey, and he remembered someone coming to pay a bill. Police identified Aron using records from the office, and 40 minutes later he was arrested, shortly before 3 am Wednesday.

Aron told police where to find the rest of the body; it was in pieces, wrapped in plastic bags, inside a red suitcase that had been tossed into a trash bin in another Brooklyn neighborhood, Kelly said.

Previous attempt to abduct?

Police said there was no evidence the boy was sexually assaulted, but they would not otherwise shed any light on a motive except to say Aron told them he "panicked" when he saw photos of the missing boy on fliers that were distributed in the neighborhood. Police were looking into whether Aron had a history of mental illness.

Police said Aron, who is divorced, lives alone in an attic in a building shared with his father and uncle.

Kelly said it was "totally random" that Aron grabbed the boy, and aside from a summons for urinating in public, he had no criminal record. A neighbor told authorities her son had said Aron had once tried to lure him into his car, but nothing happened and she didn't think much of it until the news of the killing, police said.

Aron's ex-wife, Debora Aron, said Levi injured his head when he was hit by a car while riding his bike at the age of 9 and suffered problems stemming from that accident.

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