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A man who was kidnapped from hospital as a newborn baby has been found 55 years after he went missing.
According to Chicago’s WGN TV station, which participated in the search for baby Paul Fronczak, he is living in Michigan in the US under a different name.
It was a captivating story in 1964, writes Ben Bradley of WGN.
“One day after Chester and Dora Fronczak became the proud parents of the baby boy, a woman wearing white and appearing to be a nurse entered Dora Fronczak’s [Michael Reese Hospital] room and said she would take the baby to see the doctor. She never returned,” Ben continues.
Two years after a vigorous search by the FBI, local police and even postal services, a boy who was thought to be Paul was found abandoned outside a New Jersey shop and reunited with the Fronczaks.
His identity was never scientifically confirmed as this happened decades before DNA testing.
According to Las Vegas Review Journal, Paul found articles about the kidnapping in his home when he was 10 years old and his parents “forbade him from mentioning it again”.
He didn’t talk about it, but there was always the idea at the back of his mind that he might not be the real Paul.
But the birth of his daughter in 2009 made him reconsider.
“When my daughter was born and the doctor asked for my medical history, I spouted off like I always do . . . And then I started thinking as the words were coming out, ‘Is this really my medical history? Am I doing an injustice to my daughter,’” Las Vegas Review Journal quotes Paul.
Three years later, the publication adds, he bought an over-the-counter DNA testing kit and convinced his parents to provide swabs.
The results came back negative: Paul was not the real Paul Fronczak.
The Daily Mail reports that Paul hired a genetic genealogist to trace his family in 2015 and learnt that his birth name was Jack Rosenthal.
“The only reason I started this journey was to find my parents' kidnapped son, Paul,” he told the Daily Mail.
Investigations into finding the real Paul were reopened and WGN says its investigative journalists followed several leads that took them to a small town in Michigan.
“That’s where we found the man living under a different name. At his request, we are not identifying him because he was a crime victim, The man was aware of the evidence that concluded he was the baby abducted from a Chicago hospital more than a half-century ago. He apparently learnt about it several months ago and was still coming to grips with the ramifications.”
The man hasn’t confirmed his plans to meet his biological mother Dora, and he won’t get the opportunity to meet his father Chester because he died a few years ago.
Sources: WGN-TV, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Daily Mail
