The wheels were set in motion for the outcome of this case long before the criminals were even arrested. How so? The emergency units were called to the trailer home (3431 Libby Drive) of Patrick Bourgeois in Columbus, Ohio on February 28th, 1996. They were told "someone was having trouble breathing". In route to the home, they learned it was a child and stepped up the pace. When the EMT's arrived at the scene they pounded on the door repeatedly asking to be let in, but no one came to the door. Instead, the EMT's could hear arguing inside the home, not a tormented or grief stricken arguing, but an argument between two people who were very angry with each other. The EMT's would later learn the couple was attempting to clean up the body of the already dead boy and hide the tape they had used to bind his arms and legs with. After what seemed like forever, the door finally swung open and there lie little Pj on the floor. 

Mike Bates voice breaks as he retells what he saw to Bob Greene, a Chicago Tribune reporter who has taken this case to a personal level. " I remember the moment that I saw the human bite marks on his side. Like someone had taken a bite out of his flesh. You could see where every tooth had bitten the boys skin. Upper and lower." Bates reported that he kept looking at the child face as he worked to bring him back to life. "His ears were red and bruised, like someone had pulled on them. One of the ears had these fingernail marks, like someone had ripped at it."

Once Pj's still lifeless body reached Children's Hospital's emergency room, Bates reported seeing more bite marks on his back and neck. He also saw markings from the tape they had used to bind him on his legs and arms.   

Mike Cogdill, a paramedic assigned to the ER that evening recalls when Pj was rushed into the ER. Cogdill recalls trying to insert an I.V. line, he took the lifeless childs left arm when he saw one of the many bite marks on Pj's body. He then noticed the "furry stuff" on Pj's wrists and ankles where he'd been bound by tape. Cogdill said "Had they of shot him in the head, he would have suffered less." Cogdill's 30 minute trip home that night was a trip made in tears. 

The forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy on Pj, Dr. Patrick M. Fardal, has stated publicly that what he found was not "accidental". What he stated was "It was a homicide by child abuse." Dr. Fardal states clearly Pj's cause of death, "He was beaten and he was physically restrained, and while he was restrained he swallowed his own blood and choked to death on it." The autopsy report concludes that the beating Pj suffered was brutal to say the least.

Pj's forehead and mouth were cut, and "abundant blood is seen to come out of the nose of this patient." Deep human bite marks were found on his left side and the back of his neck. There were abrasions around both of Pj's ears, which would later be learned came from the boy being drug around by his ears. The autopsy also showed eight bruises on the underside of Pj's scalp, which are undoubtedly the result of very hard blows to the head. There was bleeding on the surface of Pj's brain along with substantial swelling. There was blood in his lungs, in his airway, blood in his small bowel, his esophagus and stomach.  

I realize what you've just read probably disgusted you, but that was my intention. My intention was for you to realize what happened to this poor innocent child, this defenseless child so that when you read the following pages and see what the justice system did to him afterwards, you'll be as compelled as I was to try to make a change. You see the injustice didn't stop there, it didn't stop with Pj's death, it would continue on through our courts system to Franklin County Common Pleas Court Judge Nodine Miller who claimed they had shown remorse and freed them from jail after only 3 years, to the prosecuting attorneys who refused to file murder one charges, to the defending attorneys who abused the "super shock probation" law, to Pj's father and his girlfriend who now walk the streets as free people. For a full scope of the miscarriage of justice, read the following articles. I'll just about guarantee that you'll be as angry as I am.