Paul Modrowski

Background

In late 1992 Modrowski went to reside with Robert Faraci and his wife Rose, after allegedly struggling through relational issues with his father.

On January 18, 1993, a woman and her daughter discovered a human body missing its head, left arm and right hand, along the railroad tracks in Barrington, Illinois. Through a note found in the victim's clothing containing two phone numbers, the corpse was identified as Dean Fawcett, who had gone missing in late December 1992.

On April 22, 1993, Robert Faraci was arrested for the murder of Dean Fawcett. Afterwards Faraci and his wife alleged Modrowski committed the crime. They also named Modrowski as the perpetrator in the nearby Brown's Chicken massacre, which had occurred on January 8, 1993.

Based on these accusations, members of the Palatine Task Force arrested Modrowski on April 28, 1993, charging him as a second suspect in the Dean Fawcett murder.

Modrowski alleges he was held without legal representation for 30 hours and beaten by two law enforcement officers, John Robertson and John Koziol, before Robertson, the officer who Paul alleged was the most violent against him, procured the false confession of him admitting lending his car to Faraci.

Brown's Chicken Massacre and Modrowski's allegations

It was initially alleged that Modrowski was also responsible for the Brown's Chicken massacre, due to the proximity, timing and brutal nature of the two crimes. Although Modrowski was never charged in the Brown's Chicken murders, he remained a prime suspect, until the arrest of Juan Luna and James Degorski in 2002.

Faraci and Modrowski were both tried for the murder of Dean Fawcett by two separate juries. The prosecution argued that the three men were involved in a check writing scheme and that Fawcett was murdered on the night of December 28, 1992, after threatening to come forward to police. Faraci was tried for the murder, while Modrowski was tried under Illinois murder accountability law. Officer John Robertson testified that Modrowski confessed to lending Faraci his car to carry out the murder. Modrowski denies this in his blog.

Modrowski also claims that his defense attorney William Von Hoene refused to dispute Robertson's testimony and did not allow any witnesses to testify on his behalf (including Modrowski's sister who reports that Modrowski was with her the night of the murder). Van Hoene also did not reveal Modrowski's diagnosis of autism to the jury. Modrowski has made allegations that this led jury members to mistake his awkward body language, lack of eye contact and aloofness (autistic traits) as lack of remorse and proven guilt. Ultimately, Faraci's wife confessed to framing Modrowski in order to have the blame removed from her husband. Despite Faraci being acquitted of murder, two days later on February 17, 1995, Modrowski was found guilty of murder accountability. On April 27, 1995, Modrowski was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole by Associate Cook County Judge Sam Amirante, who told Modrowski, "I am going to give you the same hope that you gave to (Fawcett): no hope. . . . You deserve the term of natural life in prison."

Prison blog

From 2009 to 2015, Modrowski produced a blog from prison by hand-writing letters which were published in blog format by his family. His blog described what daily life was like at Stateville Correctional Center and also provided readers further information about his case, arrest and trial. Modrowski has never seen the blog, since his prison does not allow internet access.

Since 2015 Modrowski is no longer publishing his blog. Modrowski alleges that this is due to his mother censoring the content of his writing before it was published. Paul's mother censored his blog and refused to point out that Paul was an atheist, and on the podcast, she confessed that she refused to have people know that Paul is an atheist for fear that other people would judge Paul because of his religious views.

Appeals

Following his 1995 conviction, Modrowski exhausted all of his regular set of appeals without success.

After exhausting his regular set of appeals, Modrowski has filed five unsuccessful clemency petitions to the Illinois State Governor. He is currently working on his sixth clemency petition as well as seeking out a post-conviction appeal through legal counsel and the University of Illinois Innocence Project, in which he requests to have his DNA tested.