Public’s help gives a name
to dead homeless man

By Lauren Fritsky
Times Staff Writer

The eulogies have come before the funeral.
One anonymous writer scribbled on an index card: "Very good guy. Very sad ending. I’m proud to have known him. God rest him."
An anonymous caller detailed his past: He lived with his mother until her death a decade ago. Worked at a newsstand. Was a "nice guy."
One Northeast native who now lives in Texas said he was "like an uncle to me."
Suddenly, after six months of unknowns, the Frankford man who died without a last name or next of kin now has loved ones far and wide.
After an Aug. 30 Northeast Times story on Paul, a vagrant who died of natural causes on a bench near SEPTA’s Frankford Terminal in March, calls, e-mails and letters poured in from readers who said they’d known him at one point in their lives.
The tips helped the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office make a positive identification on Paul. On Monday, the Department of Health confirmed that he was Paul Michulak, 56. It’s up to his next of kin, who include two siblings, to claim his remains, said department spokesman Jeff Moran.
Had it not been for an investigator in the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office and a concerned Frankford resident, the case might never have reached the public.
Gripped by the case, investigator Steve Olszewski distributed fliers with Paul’s picture and physical description to the community and posted messages on PhillyBlog.com
His fervency caught the attention of Frankford resident Tara Lynn, who remembered Paul as the man she gave a "hello" or a dollar to while walking near the Frankford Terminal. Soon, Lynn began helping Olszewski comb the community for information.
"Everybody that passed him must have known him," she said.
Despite Olszewski’s and Lynn’s efforts over the summer, no one came forward with the key pieces of the puzzle. After the Times ran the story with a picture of Paul, individuals began calling and writing to both the paper and the ME’s office with vital information.
Robin Biscaya, who grew up in Frankford but now lives in Texas, knew Paul because her mother dated Paul’s brother, John. Biscaya described Paul as a quiet, hard-working guy who hadn’t been on the streets for more than a year.
The scruffy, bearded man had worked at a newsstand outside the terminal and lived with his mother until her passing about 10 years ago, Biscaya said. The exact circumstances of his transition to the streets of Frankford are unknown.
"Whether or not they’re homeless, everybody’s life means something," she said. "He was always a sweet guy, never bothered nobody."
Still, even after Paul lost his home, he made a meager living by carrying people’s grocery bags, according to Biscaya’s mother, Robin Williams, who recently moved to Texas from Frankford. Williams kept in touch with Paul and talked to him shortly before he died. She thinks untreated gangrene ultimately led to his death.
"When he became homeless, I tried to befriend him," Williams said. "He was always upbeat. He could be standing in the rain and he’d be smiling."
Both Lynn and Williams think a memorial of some sort would be appropriate for the man who subsisted on the smiles, spare change and simple greetings of the Frankford folk who passed him on the streets.
"He kept saying, ‘I’m gonna be all right,’" Williams recalled. ••
Reporter Lauren Fritsky can be reached at 215-354-3038 or lfritsky@phillynews.com