FREE PAUL MODROWSKI

Why should an autistic man spend the rest of his life in prison not for committing murder, but for supposedly lending his car to a person who was acquitted?

That is unfortunately what has happened to Paul Modrowski, an 18 year old man in 1993 when he was wrongly convicted of accountability to murder for supposedly lending his car to his friend, Robert Faraci.

Robert, (aka Bob Faraci) fabricated a story stating that his former friend Paul Modrowski went into a chicken resturant on the night of January 8, 1993 and killed seven people. The News media went crazy with the idea and Mr. Modrowski became the primary suspect.

Paul was arrested on April 28, 1993 and immediately he was taken into questioning. Because Paul asked for an attorney upon being arrested, he was told he wasn't going to have one during his interrogaiton. He was interrogated by two police officers, one officer was a Palatine police officer. He interrogated Paul as part of the Palatine task force to find out in Paul was the person who killed 7 in the chicken restaurant after Robert Faraci implicated his autistic friend in the killings, even though Paul has never been to the town.   

The other police officer, John Robertson, also part of the Palatine Task Force was sent by the state's attorney's office to interrogate Paul. 

During his interrogation Paul was taken into a room where the windows were boarded up and despite his repetitious request for a lawyer during his interrogation, he didn't have one for the whole interrogation and since he was truly innocent, he never talked

The allegations of the abuse that Paul went through were proven to be true. However, Sam Amirante, the judge in the Barrington trial, said the questioning policies the palatine polcie department used were allowed, even though they broke laws because of the then unsolved massacre Paul was falsely accused of.  http://www.nwitimes.com/uncategorized/judge-oks-palatine-cops-questioning-policy/article_e1645b66-81f6-53ac-9044-3f2b5a7f2543.html

During the trial, Robertson's testimony had no evidence of Paul's confession, other than his testimony, so no official confession was obtained, other than hand written notes, which were likely fabricated by the officers. The confession wasn't signed and written until 3 weeks after the original interrogation, leaving room for lots of time to fabricate, or alter a story. 

Robert Farachi's wife, confessed that her husband was the real murderer and Paul was simply a scapegoat, as is written in this article.http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1995-01-25/news/9501250246_1_grand-jury-murder-trials-pasta-restaurant

Then, to make matters worse, Mr. Faraci again falsely claimed that Paul Modrowski killed his friend Dean Fawcett to get the prosecution off of his case. 

Even though Farachi confessed to the crime, he was acquitted after "testifying" that he was really innocent.

10 years later after Paul's arrest, the real perpetrators to the Palatine massacre were arrested and confessed to the crime. 

John Robertson not only physically abused Paul and threatened him to confess and denied Paul access to an attorney, but John Robertson was the officer who made a false statement that Paul Modrowski confessed to giving his car to Robert Faraci, and said Faraci told Paul he wanted to kill Dean Fawcett and Paul lent him his car. 

The worst thing is that during his trial, Paul was told by his attorney William Von Horne not to testify especially after Faraci was acquitted, but after Paul argued with the attorney,he threatened that he would leave his case if he testified! 

Despite the threat, Paul still wanted to testify, but the attorney also convinced Paul's family not to testify that Paul was with his sister and Brother in law's house on the night of December 28, 1992 when Dean Fawcett was murdered. Paul was home because it was his father's birthday. 

Paul's attorney didn't want to Paul to testify because since Faraci was acquitted, there was no reason to keep Paul on trial since the person Paul was accused on lending his car to had been found not guilty. 

Also, Paul's incopetent lawyer didn't notify Paul's jury of his diagnosis of his autism.

 His lack of emotional expression, and lack of eye contact as a result of his autism, the strong bias against him due to the belief that he was responsible for the Brown's Chicken Restaurant in Palatine, was all the Jury needed to convict him all without any DNA evidence using just a statement from his interrogating officer and false allegations from his friend.

Had the jury known of his autism diagnosis, they would have very likely not have convicted him.  

 during his interrogation Paul was taken into a room where the windows were boarded up and despite his repetitious request for a lawyer during his interrogation, he didn't have one for the whole interrogation and since he was truly innocent, he never talked.

Later when the judge who sentenced to paul to spent the rest of hisn natural life in prison found out that Paul was autistic, he said that he would have never sentenced him to life had he known that he was autistic. 

Please sign this petition asking that he be freed, or at the very least grant him a re-trial.