This story actually ran on July 2, but I didn’t find out about it till now: “Paul Fronczak” has been identified. In a nutshell, for people who aren’t familiar with this case: a newborn named Paul Fronczak was abducted from a Chicago hospital in 1964. In 1965, a toddler who was about the age Paul would have been was found abandoned in New Jersey. The Fronczak family thought he was their missing son, but the identification could not be conclusively established due to unavailability of DNA testing, etc., at that time, so they had to go through adoption procedures. There the matter rested until 2012, when “Paul” had himself tested and found out he was not related to his presumed parents. This made national news and the baby Paul Fronczak was re-listed as missing at the time.
Well, according to the article I linked to above, not-Paul Fronczak has been identified by a “genetic genealogist” as a child named Jack, one of five kids in his family. His parents and one of his siblings are dead now; two are still alive. Jack has a twin sister named Jill (groan) and she’s missing. The twins disappeared shortly before their second birthdays, but their parents never told anyone; both sides of their family thought the children were living with the other side. The family’s last name has not been released as of yet, but relatives told not-Paul “dark tales” about the parents.
In other words, this seems like a Michelle Pulsifer type case. You gotta wonder how many times this sort of thing used to happen back in the days before computerized public records and what have you.
I wonder if Jill was also abandoned somewhere and is still out there, not knowing who she really is. It seems a lot more likely, though, that she died about fifty years ago.
Meanwhile, the real Paul Fronczak remains among the missing. What a bizarre case.
The Charley Project Blog 
The Paul Fronczak case was actually how I found the Charley project!
Such a baffling and sad case all around for both families. I wonder what ever happened to the real Paul…. I am sure he was raised by someone who wanted a child and had no idea of who he really was… I wonder if the case will ever be solved.
Now “Jack” has a whole new mystery on his hands to solve. I wonder if Jill will ever be located – or like you said is she already gone…
“I am sure he was raised by someone who wanted a child and had no idea of who he really was”
Or he was raised by someone who wanted a child badly enough to steal someone else’s.
That is for sure.
I personally have been battling fertility issues for several years now. I can honestly say its NEVER crossed my mind to STEAL someone else’s!! I will never understand that… never.
They think they found who stole them and it wasn’t someone who wanted a baby, it was a woman who stole babies, so she could sell them for cash. 😦
He was most likely taken by Linda Taylor, who had some kind of adoption ring going. Slate did an article on her last year, she was the woman who led Reagan to coin the term “welfare queen.” Very interesting article about a very messed up sociopath.
I’m inclined to think the real Paul will not be found anytime soon. I think a lot of hospital abductions are by people who want a kid or people who want to sell a kid and either way…that baby has to either know they were adopted or feel they don’t belong, grow up wanting to know the truth AND with the desire to keep digging like not-Paul AND have the means to do so. That’s quite a lot of stars to align, so to speak.
As genealogy becomes more popular and the records more easily accessible (like on ancestry.com), it will be interesting to see if more of these stories come out and are solved.
The real Paul is most likely dead
What makes you think that?
Considering infant abductions are the ones with the highest rate of alive recoveries, even when strangers do them, I doubt that.
Circumstances of his case, the length of time passed – they don’t seem to bode well for his life expectancy at this point, even if he wasn’t murdered.
He’d be in his fifties. Not ancient by far.
Yes, I know that – but that wasn’t really my point. That said, I don’t think you could include him with average adult US males when looking at life expectancy.
He was kidnapped, there’s apparently been no trace of him since, and we have no clue what kind of people raised him – although we know that at least one of adults involved with his young life (for whatever amount of time) had the mindset of a serious criminal.
These factors (and there are others surely) put him at great risk – anyway, it’s kind of silly to debate whether his temp is 98.6 or 0 because we have no clue what Paul is up to right now – we hope he is alive and well – though I suspect he’s not.
Under the circumstances — given that Paul’s parents “found” him and then have lost him again — I wonder if they would be better off not knowing what happened to the real Paul than finding out he was dead — thereby losing him a THIRD time. I usually think it’s better for the parents to know their child was dead than to never know its fate at all, but this is not your usual missing child case.
From the story that Linda’s son told I’m more concerned that the real Paul was bought by someone like the guy who stole Steven Stayner
This story is so heartbreaking. I have toddler boy-girl twins too and can’t imagine just abandoning one or both of them. I agree Meaghan, I think his twin sister is likely deceased. If so, I have a feeling it was probably due to abuse or neglect on the parents’ part.
I agree, It’s too bad neither of the parents are alive today so they can’t be called to answer for their behavior.
They left Jack/Paul where he could quickly be found so hopefully did the same with Jill.
The whole thing is weird. “Jack’s” family had little time for him and his sister Jill, and the birth parents didn’t want to talk about their missing kids. Paul Fronczak probably did better with the Fronczaks than he would have with his birth parents. It also reminds me of one strange feature it has In common with the Suzanne Sevakis case. Both cases involved the kidnapping of a younger sibling who was never heard from again. Franklin Floyd took Suzanne and brother Clifford, Jr. when their mother Sandra was locked up on bad check charges. Sandra tried to report her children missing to the local police, but they refused to accept a report. That demostrates sheer incompetence on the part of law enforcement. We also know that Floyd was able to abduct Suzanne’s son Michael from his school, and Michael was never seen again.
So Clifford is still among the missing?
FYI there is an update on the Suzanne Sevakis/ Sharon Marshall case. See ” A beautiful child” Facebook page.