Niece's Tragic LI Murder, In Battle Lost With Domestic Violence, Inspires Cancer Warrior Aunt's Activism

MEDFORD, NY — This week brings back memories for Lisa Cucuzza-Jimenez.

Thirteen years ago, she was going for a procedure at the hospital when her niece, Elizabeth Marie Hernandez, a mother of two young children, went missing. When her sister told her, she was in the hospital and wanted immediately to be signed out so that she could change out of her hospital gown and leave.

“I guess I thought that I was going to go look for her,” she recalled.

Jimemenz was scheduled to have gallbladder surgery this week with the same doctor from 13 years ago.

"It is kind of like it's in the same area,” she said. “It just brought up a lot of memories, especially when I walked in the room, and he looked at me.”

Hernandez, a 33-year-old Medford native, was murdered by her boyfriend in her Shirley apartment on July 25, 2013, NBC reported.

She had been dating an older, quiet gentleman who had bought her a car and showered her with gifts. He had been previously married and had the same job for 2o years.

"We thought everything was okay, and evidently it wasn't," she said. "My sister had the kids — Thank God — the night he had been arrested for hitting her, and then somebody had bailed him out, and they never told my niece that he was out of jail. So he went after her as soon as he got out."

Hernandez had been in the hospital, but after that, she was missing for a couple of days, and Jimenez's sister thought something was wrong."

"She was looking for her daughter all over the place," she said. "Long story short, it was about a week, and he was supposed to show up for his court appearance. He never did, and then I guess the bail bondsman went looking for him."

When the bondsman, who was former law enforcement, went to her apartment, he recognized the smell.

“[Her boyfriend] had been there the whole time,” said Jimenez, making reference to the fact that he had been staying at the apartment.

“It was the middle of July, so you could just imagine," she said.

Hernandez's body was found stabbed and hidden in the home, where police had previously been called on numerous occasions, after she had been missing for almost a week, and her boyfriend was, in the views of the Suffolk County Police Department’s Homicide Chief at the time, Jack Fitzpatrick, conspicuously absent, according to reports.

"He fled the country," she said. "It was horrible; you could imagine."

Cleon Brown, who fled the country to Jamaica after he was indicted, was later captured in April 2014 by a fugitive team, The Associated Press reported.

He got 25 years to life with no parole.Jimenez had always planned on doing something in her niece’s honor, but health troubles got in the way, so it was placed on hold.

But she did take up women’s causes. She found her way to a group called Underground Railroad, which brings awareness and education to sex trafficking and has been active with them for the last three and a half years.

“I always wanted to do something to incorporate with my niece, whether it be a non-for-profit or scholarship or just something, and that's how I came up with the idea of a blessing box,” she said.

After A Setback, Plans Take Shape

In December 2023, she told her husband that it was time to get rolling: bring awareness and help the community, but again her plans were derailed by a breast cancer diagnosis two months later in February.

“I've been actually fighting and surviving,” she said, adding that Valentine's Day was her third year since being diagnosed.”

She’s been treating since then, but earlier this January decided to put her plan into action.

“Then I finally said to my husband, “It's time,’” she said. “He goes, ‘What do you want?’ I said, ‘I want the box.’ Little Bit’s Blessing Box is for her.”

Jimenez used to call her niece “Little Bit” and the box, which is painted white, features blue butterflies, which are a shared symbol she had with her niece.

It symbolizes being free. “Butterflies are powerful. I mean, they're beautiful,” she said. “I always told her she was beautiful, and she was powerful. And, you know, tried to build her up, you know, with different things. So that was, like, our symbol for her.”

The box, which is located outside Jimenez’s home on Maple Street, is set up as a food pantry, in which people make donations or take what they need. It’s mostly for non-perishable, canned goods, but sometimes people make other donations such as baby diapers and clothes.

“I think that the blessing box has really taken off,” she said. “It's being utilized by not only the Medford community but outside communities also.”

Jimenez has been advertising on TikTok, and she is planning a video.

“My nephew and I and a couple of his friends were going to be – what we're going to call it – dancing for donations,” she said. We have a song picked out, and that's going to be our theme song. And we're going to dress up, and we're going to dance in front of the box for donations.”

“So yeah, we're getting a lot of traction, and I'm happy, very happy to say that the box is being utilized outside of the Medford community, which is what I wanted,” he said. “Because, like we discussed, ultimately my goal is to maybe have a blessing box in every community as needed.”

Moving Through Her Illness And Goals For Little Bit’s Blessing BoxJimenez has been battling breast cancer for three years.

As it stands now, it’sbeen traveling through her blood, and her doctors have been fighting it as it’s popping up.

“Basically, that's what I'm doing as they're finding it, I'm getting surgeries,” she said. So we're dealing with it that way. I'm doing a lot of holistic, proper eating, exercise.”

It started with breast cancer, but its “kind of like landing all over,” she says.

She had masses in her two ankles, then another on the lens of her right eye, then left – all the while battling lymphedema from her mastectomy.

Despite her treatment, she has time to organize her donations.

The box is cleaned – wiped down – every couple of days, and everything's taken out. The dates on the items are all checked. She always keeps another box underneath to carry in goods, like fresh meat and vegetables, that could expire sooner in the heat.

When the box is full, Jimenez puts a post out that its first-come, first-serve, but anyone who needs more, can always message her.

The box is always watched, if not by her family, then neighbors.

When Jimenez first started she wanted slow and steady to stay the race,“I wanted to start something small, because I'll be honest with you, my health is not the best,” she said. “So I knew that I could start this right now.”

She felt she could really focus on the box. “I knew that hard times are coming, and people are going through hard times, and it was just, for me, it was just the right time,” she said. “Let's kick it, let's get it going.”

The fact that her niece is gone and has begun her healing by helping others still feels surreal.

“It just doesn't really feel real,” she said. And then when I watch all these other stories, like on "Dateline," and things like that, I just think to myself, people have no idea. Like people are still going through this, and what more can I do to change the situation and bring awareness?”

To stop domestic violence, it’s going to take more awareness, according to Jimenez.“

I don't know. I hope so. I pray,” she said. “I do know that from when Elizabeth passed till now, there is more awareness. There's more education on it. There's more awareness to domestic violence and child trafficking. So yeah, there is more awareness out there, but I don't know if it's enough. So all you can do is just keep educating, just keep spreading the word, and just trying to make people be aware.”

But the Blessing Box in its own way has brought healing with the help that it has provided to the community. Jimenez wants everyone to know that the blessing box is just there to help everybody, regardless of what their situation is.

“Any and everybody is welcome to that box,” she said. “They can take what they need. They do not have to donate if they don't have it. If they do, I would love it, but they don't.”