Divers from the Cook County Sheriff’s Department on Thursday searched a pond next door to a Palos Township home where prosecutors say 17-year-old John Granat bludgeoned his parents to death.
No weapon had been found this week when Granat was charged with two counts of murder in his parents’ death. The large but shallow man-made pond separates the Granats’ immaculately groomed yard from their neighbors’ yards.
The bodies of Granat’s father, 44-year-old John Granat, and mother, Maria, 42, were found in the bedroom of the house in the 12700 block of 81st Court on Sunday morning, both apparently beaten to death with what Sheriff Thomas Dart said was a 1-inch diameter blunt object. Maria Granat also had been stabbed repeatedly with an unknown object, Dart said.
A sheriff’s spokesman on Thursday said investigators still did not know what type of object had been used as the murder weapon.
The younger Granat called police early Sunday, claiming he went to sleep in the basement around midnight and awoke to find his parents’ bodies upstairs.
Authorities said his story unraveled when investigators learned a Palos Heights police officer had pulled over Granat for a minor traffic violation at 5:17 a.m.
