John Granat was seventeen when he orchestrated the murders of his parents in Illinois. According to court documents John Granat was upset with his parents because they found out he was growing marijuana in his bedroom and he figured the best way to solve the problem was to murder his parents. John Granat recruited three of his friends by promising him a cut of the insurance money.
On the day of the attack John Granat gave the key word and his parents were beaten to death. When he was arrested John Granat attempted to blame the murders on a drug dealer who murdered his parents however that quickly fell through. This teen killer would be sentenced to life in prison without parole.
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| Parent Institution: | MENARD CORRECTIONAL CENTER |
| Offender Status: | IN CUSTODY |
| Location: | MENARD |
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A Palos Township man was sentenced Thursday to natural life in prison for the brutal slayings of his parents.
John Granat Jr., 22, was accused of being the mastermind in the 2011 deaths of John Granat Sr. and his wife, Maria Granat. The couple’s skulls were crushed with aluminum bats, and then the dying mother was repeatedly stabbed to death.
Prosecutors alleged Granat Jr., then 17 years old, groomed three friends, showered them with cash gifts and promised more money after his parents were dead. He had become enraged with his parents after they discovered he was growing marijuana plants in his room and grounded him, prosecutors alleged. Granat Jr. remained in the family garage and quietly counted stacks of cash the family kept in the house, money he would use to pay off his friends, prosecutors alleged.
On Thursday, Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney Deborah Lawler read a statement in Judge Neil Linehan’s Bridgeview courtroom from the dead woman’s sister, Kathy Sieczka, according to court records.
“The worst part of it, (Granat Jr.) never showed any remorse or regret,” Lawler said while reading the statement. “How could you be so evil?”
The violent killings on the morning of Sept. 11, 2011, rocked the Palos Township-area community where the family lived.
Granat Jr., according to prosecutors, signaled the start of the killings by using a code word: “concert.”
Granat Jr.’s parents were brutally beaten to death in their bed.
Granat and three of his friends — Christopher Wyma, of Bridgeview; Ehab Qasem, of Hickory Hills; and Mohammed Salahat, 22, of Palos Heights — were charged in the killings.
Salahat, who drove the three others to and from the murder scene, pleaded guilty to murder last year and is serving a 35-year prison sentence. Qasem, who pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree murder in the death of Granat Sr., was sentenced earlier this month to 40 years in prison, and Wyma, who has been found guilty, is scheduled to appear in court Friday morning.
Prosecutors said Wyma and Qasem crept into the Granats’ bedroom and beat in their heads and bodies with metal baseball bats. Qasem testified that he then stabbed Maria Granat with a knife that Granat Jr. gave him.
Granat Jr. paid for clothing and shoes for the four of them with $100 bills, while giving them the change “because he does not like change,” according to Qasem’s testimony.
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A jury deliberated less than two hours before delivering a guilty verdict for a former Palos Park man accused of grooming three friends to murder his parents.
John Granat, 22, was found guilty of two counts of first-degree murder of his parents, John and Maria Granat. Granat was emotionless as the verdict was announced.
Maria’s sister, Kathy, sobbed quietly in the courtroom. After her nephew was led away, she hugged Cook County assistant state’s attorneys Donna Norton and Deborah Lawler. Less than 20 minutes later, the family went back to courtroom when a verdict was reached for Granat’s accomplice, former best friend Christopher Wyma.
The week-long trial was marked by dramatic testimony by star witness and co-defendant Ehab Qasem. In exchange for his testimony, Qasem agreed to plead guilty to one count of murder and a 40-year sentence in the Illinois Department of Corrections
John Granat was 17 years old and a senior at Stagg High School when he called 911 to report that he slept through a home invasion and found his parents bludgeoned to death and “drowning in their own blood” on Sept. 11, 2011.
The now 22-year-old man listened impassively as Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney Deborah Lawler described how Granat “kept his little paws clean counting money” as his two friends, Wyma and Qasem crept up the stairs of his parents home and beat them both to death with aluminum baseball bats.
“John and Maria could not possibly know or conceive what their only child, their baby boy, had planned,” Lawler said. “What the defendant did to his own parents is unimaginable. It takes our breath away with its sheer callousness.”
Cook County Sheriff’s detectives were on to the high schooler from the start after he said he’d been at home all night and fallen asleep in the basement. Granat’s alibi began falling apart after he was confronted about being pulled over by a Palos Heights police officer in an early morning traffic stop.
Furious and angry that his parents threw away his “little marijuana plants growing in the backyard and grounded him,” Lawler said Granat began plotting to kill his parents in the summer of 2011.
“He began scouting out people to execute his plan. He chose his best friend, Christopher Wyma, and good friends Ehab Qasem and Mohammed Salahat,” Lawler said. “He didn’t care how it was done or if his parents suffered horribly.”
After the fourth accomplice, Salahat, dropped Wyma and Qasem at the end of the Granats’ block, they were met by the young master plotter, who was hiding outside the family’s home in the bushes. Salahat left the pair and drove around the area while the murders were going down.
Lawler said that Granat made sure the first thing his friends saw when they entered the garage of the home that his father “built with his own two hands” were the stacks of money piled on a work bench.
“He made sure that his accomplices saw the stacks and stacks of one-hundred dollar bills that he had already gathered and stolen from his parents,” Lawler said.
During their first ascent up the stairs to the couple’s bedroom, Wyma’s and Qasem’s bats clinked together, sending both “speed walking” back to the garage, where Granat told them to “take care of it.”
As Qasem and Wyma stood over the sleeping couple with bats raised, John and Maria “cried and screamed” with the initial blows. As Maria took her last breaths, Granat handed Qasem a knife and told him to “finish it.”
“Maria’s skull was so badly beaten, it fell apart in [medical examiner James Philkins’ hands] like broken egg shell,” Lawler said.
Qasem stabbed the woman in the stomach, then handed the knife to Granat, while Qasem went up to the attic to look for a safe with a money.
Lawler told the jurors that in Illinois, a person is legally responsible for his or her conduct when soliciting others to do criminal acts.
“He didn’t have the courage to do it alone,” she said. “His (Granat’s) hand was on that bat and on that knife. So was Mohammed Salahat. He was responsible for the strike of those bats and the stab of that knife.”
Granat’s assistant public defender LaFonzo Palmer called the case horrific and said the teen didn’t kill his parents.
“John didn’t plan to kill anyone,” Palmer said. “He didn’t choose the weapons or tell anyone what to say to police.”
Palmer said John Granat was stupid and hanging out with the bad kids.
“He was a dumb kid trying to buy friends and be a tough guy,” Palmer said. “He hung out at Chris’s house, getting high, doing blunt runs, because his father who’s a cop and his mother don’t care.”
Palmer also tried to impeach co-defendant Qasem’s testimony, stating his testimony was “bought” by the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office in exchange for a plea deal of one count of first degree murder and 40 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections. Salahat, the driver, accepted a similar plea deal last year.
Jurors listened to five days of testimony before Judge Neil Linehan in the Bridgeview Courthouse, including interrogation videos, crime scene photos, testimony by police officers, the Cook County Medical Examiner and cellular tower experts.
John Granat and Wyma were being tried together but with separate juries at the Bridgeview Courthouse.
John Granat is due back for post-trial motions on Feb. 24, but sentencing is not expected to take place. His attorney, Palmer, told Judge Neil Linehan that he planned to bring “mitigation experts” to testify at Granat’s sentencing.
https://patch.com/illinois/palos/john-granat-found-guilty-murdering-parents-verdict
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