Search for son who was kidnapped at birth resumes after half a century

Modern technology has fuelled hopes of finding the ‘real’ Paul Fronczak, writes Carol Channing

IN 1964, newborn Paul Joseph Fronczak was stolen from the Michael Reese hospital in Chicago by a woman posing as a nurse. She was never caught.

Almost two years later, the shape of the ear of an abandoned baby found outside a discount shop in Newark, New Jersey, led investigators to believe they had found the stolen baby and Paul was “reunited” with his Chicago family.

But decades later a DNA test now reveals Paul is not the Fronczaks’ biological child.

The Fronczak case was front- page news in the city and beyond, when a woman disguised as a nurse walked into Michael Reese hospital on Apr 27, 1964, and told Dora Fronczak that her newborn was needed for an examination. The woman took the baby, got into a taxi and the two were never seen again.

Hundreds of Chicago police officers and FBI agents took part in a massive search. In July 1965, an abandoned boy resembling the missing baby turned up in Newark.

Without DNA or fingerprints, there was no proof it was Chester and Dora Fronczak’s infant, but they clung to that belief because investigators suggested the child was likely to be theirs. The Fronczaks raised that child in their home in Oak Lawn.

The tragic story made headlines earlier this year when a now middle-aged Paul Fronczak, who lives in Nevada, revealed the results of DNA testing showing he isn’t Chester and Dora Fronczak’s son.

Ever since, Paul Fronczak has been on a mission to find out his true identity and find the real Paul Fronczak.

The man who was raised as Paul Fronczak explained how he first learned of the 1964 kidnapping.

“I was snooping through the house like most kids do, around Christmas time, looking for Christmas presents, and I went in the crawlspace and found a bunch of boxes that I thought was going to be the big score, and uh, it turned out it was a bunch of things related to a kidnapping around someone named Paul Joseph Fronczak,” he said. “And that was me.”

While Fronczak’s parents shied away from media attention, the now 49-year-old Fronczak is determined to discover who he really is, and what happened to his parents’ stolen baby.

“My parents raised me, and they did a great job, and I feel that if I don’t do everything I can to help find the real child, then I’m not doing my job as a son,” he said.

And as the parent of a four-year-old daughter, he says he is especially eager to discover his own biological heritage for her sake and his own.

“I mean, and to me, in their heart, I was their son, and that’s all that mattered,” he said. “I have been struggling with the fact that I want to know if the real Fronczak baby is still alive, and what happened. I also want to find out who I am, and why I was abandoned.”

Now, nearly 50 years later, following media attention, the FBI announced it is reopening the cold case of the kidnapped baby. “We want to see if the case might be benefited by modern technology not available at the time of the original investigation,” said FBI spokeswoman Joan Hyde.