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A former Klansman and neo-Nazi, Franklin is the embodiment of absolute bigotry. He believed that interracial marriages where a sin against God and took it upon himself to punish the guilty. He enjoyed sniper attacks on interracial couples and killed for sport. Once, he killed two black men and a white woman who were jogging together. He is suspected of having shot and crippled Larry Flynt -- publisher of Husler magazine and pillar of First Amendment rights -- because he regularly featured pictorials of blacks and whites getting it on. The archetypical headline-grabbing killer, Joe also confessed to shooting civil rights leader (and now confidant of President Clinton), Vernon Jordan.
Born James Clayton Vaughn, Franklin legally changed his name to honor Benjamin Franklin and Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. His first known attack was the bombing of Beth Shalom Synagogue in Chattanooga, Tenn., in July 1977. From then until September 1980, he is suspected of killing at least 17 people -- three interracial couples, seven black men and boys, three female hitchhikers and a Jewish man. During his spree, Franklin survived by robbing banks and selling his blood. He was arrested in October 1980 at a blood bank in Lakeland, Fla. As well as the murders, investigators believe Franklin is responsible for five other shootings, 16 bank robberies and two bombings, in a crime spree spanning 11 states.
On November, 1996, Joseph gave a detailed confession of the June 25,1980, deaths of two women who were shot at close range with a high-powered rifle while hitchhiking to a West Virginia peace retreat. After charges were filed and dropped several times, Florida resident Jacob Beard was convicted of first-degree murder in 1993.
State Police Supt. Col. Thom Kirk said: "He could have zero credibility, or he could have one hundred percent credibility... We're checking out the details he's giving us and tracking them as far as we can. Then we'll hand it to the prosecutor." Franklin first confessed to killing Nancy Santomero, 19, and Vicki Durian, 26, in 1984 . Prosecutors said that a map Franklin drew of the murder scene back then was too general and lacked distinct landmarks and did not corroborate his confession. The initial confession was also "too brief. He got to a certain point and he just stopped talking. Now, he's giving us a lot more details and specifics."
Santomero and Durian were shot while en route to a weeklong encampment of the counterculture Rainbow Family in a national forest in eastern West Virginia. Santomero was shot three times in the head; Durian twice in the chest. No weapon was recovered in the killings, dubbed the "Rainbow Murders." At least seven men have been indicted and in January, 1993, Beard was convicted after several witnesses placed him and his red pickup truck at the scene the day of the shooting.
In February, a Missouri jury sentenced the lethal racist to die for the 1977 shooting of Gerald Gordon, 42, outside a synagogue. Franklin, not one for understatements, told police he wanted to kill as many Jews and blacks as possible. A courteous killer, he thanked the jury for a "fair trial" and added, if he was not executed, he would certainly kill again.
On April 15, 1997, Franklin was charged by a grand jury in Cincinnati with the June 1980 murders of two black teen-agers. The two teens Dante Brown, 13, and Darrell Lane, were shot from a railroad trestle while walking to a convinience store. Franklin implicated himself in the shootings during a conversation on April 13 with an assistant prosecutor. Authorities had long considered Franklin a suspect in the slayings but said they did not have enough evidence to act until he agreed to talk to an assistant Hamilton County prosecutor and implicated himself in the shootings. He also confessed to killing an interracial couple in June 1980 in Johnstown, Ohio.
In February, 1997, a Missouri jury sentenced the lethal racist to die for the 1977 shooting of Gerald Gordon, 42, outside a Clayton, Montana, synagogue. Franklin had told police he wanted to kill as many Jews a possible. He also said he despised blacks, and had a special hatred for interracial couples. He has recieved life sentences in Utah and Wisconsin for four murders, an interracial couple in Madison, Wisconsin, and two black men in Salt Lake City who were jogging with two white women.
In what's becoming a semi-annual event, on January, 1998, Joe admitted to killing an interracial couple as they walked down a street in 1980. A compulsive confessor, Franklin convinced investigators that he is the one who shot Arthur Smothers, 22, and Kathleen Mikula, 16. In a purely random killing, Joe snipped at the youngster as they were crossing a bridge in Johnston, about 60 miles east of Pittsburg. "He gave us information that could only be supplied by the perpetrator that was never in the paper that corroborated the physical evidence," District Attorney David Tulowitzki said. "He's not remorseful," Johnstown police Chief Robert Huntley said. "You could actually see him get excited when he described the murders. ... He gets louder and he gets a little fidgety in the chair."
On March 4, 1998, Franklin pleaded guilty to the 1978 murder of a black man in Chattanooga. He admitted to shooting William Tatum outside a Chattanooga restaurant because Tatum was with a white woman. According to Assistant District Attorney General Joseph Rehyansky, Franklin -- who he calls a "homicidal moron" -- has undergone "some sort of bizarre religious conversion." A believer in numerology, he demanded the court hearing be on the fourht, because the day -- the 63rd of the year -- corresponded with his favorite number -- 3.
On April 2, 1998, Franklin -- apparently drunk on confession juice -- admitted to the 1979 slayings of Mercedes Lynn Masters, 15, and restaurant manager Harold McIver, 27. DeKalb County District Attorney J. Tom Morgan called Franklin "the most evil individual I have ever come across," and said the killings were motivated by racial hatred. In the jailhouse confession, Franklin said he had a sexual relationship with Mercedes, who was white, and killed her after she told him she had sex with blacks. He said he gunned down McIver -- who was black -- because he worked with young, white girls at a Taco Bell, and thought he would hit on them.
Morgan told WSB-TV in Atlanta that his office was told about 10 days ago that Franklin might be willing to talk, demanding "at attractive white female investigator." He wished for a Jodie Foster type to interview him like in the film "The Silence of the Lambs."
A former Klansman and neo-Nazi, Franklin is the embodiment of absolute bigotry. He believed that interracial marriages where a sin against God and took it upon himself to punish the guilty. He enjoyed sniper attacks on interracial couples and killed for sport. Once, he killed two black men and a white woman who were jogging together. He is suspected of having shot and crippled Larry Flynt -- publisher of Husler magazine and pillar of First Amendment rights -- because he regularly featured pictorials of blacks and whites getting it on. The archetypical headline-grabbing killer, Joe also confessed to shooting civil rights leader (and now confidant of President Clinton), Vernon Jordan.
Born James Clayton Vaughn, Franklin legally changed his name to honor Benjamin Franklin and Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. His first known attack was the bombing of Beth Shalom Synagogue in Chattanooga, Tenn., in July 1977. From then until September 1980, he is suspected of killing at least 17 people -- three interracial couples, seven black men and boys, three female hitchhikers and a Jewish man. During his spree, Franklin survived by robbing banks and selling his blood. He was arrested in October 1980 at a blood bank in Lakeland, Fla. As well as the murders, investigators believe Franklin is responsible for five other shootings, 16 bank robberies and two bombings, in a crime spree spanning 11 states.
On November, 1996, Joseph gave a detailed confession of the June 25,1980, deaths of two women who were shot at close range with a high-powered rifle while hitchhiking to a West Virginia peace retreat. After charges were filed and dropped several times, Florida resident Jacob Beard was convicted of first-degree murder in 1993.
State Police Supt. Col. Thom Kirk said: "He could have zero credibility, or he could have one hundred percent credibility... We're checking out the details he's giving us and tracking them as far as we can. Then we'll hand it to the prosecutor." Franklin first confessed to killing Nancy Santomero, 19, and Vicki Durian, 26, in 1984 . Prosecutors said that a map Franklin drew of the murder scene back then was too general and lacked distinct landmarks and did not corroborate his confession. The initial confession was also "too brief. He got to a certain point and he just stopped talking. Now, he's giving us a lot more details and specifics."
Santomero and Durian were shot while en route to a weeklong encampment of the counterculture Rainbow Family in a national forest in eastern West Virginia. Santomero was shot three times in the head; Durian twice in the chest. No weapon was recovered in the killings, dubbed the "Rainbow Murders." At least seven men have been indicted and in January, 1993, Beard was convicted after several witnesses placed him and his red pickup truck at the scene the day of the shooting.
In February, a Missouri jury sentenced the lethal racist to die for the 1977 shooting of Gerald Gordon, 42, outside a synagogue. Franklin, not one for understatements, told police he wanted to kill as many Jews and blacks as possible. A courteous killer, he thanked the jury for a "fair trial" and added, if he was not executed, he would certainly kill again.
On April 15, 1997, Franklin was charged by a grand jury in Cincinnati with the June 1980 murders of two black teen-agers. The two teens Dante Brown, 13, and Darrell Lane, were shot from a railroad trestle while walking to a convinience store. Franklin implicated himself in the shootings during a conversation on April 13 with an assistant prosecutor. Authorities had long considered Franklin a suspect in the slayings but said they did not have enough evidence to act until he agreed to talk to an assistant Hamilton County prosecutor and implicated himself in the shootings. He also confessed to killing an interracial couple in June 1980 in Johnstown, Ohio.
In February, 1997, a Missouri jury sentenced the lethal racist to die for the 1977 shooting of Gerald Gordon, 42, outside a Clayton, Montana, synagogue. Franklin had told police he wanted to kill as many Jews a possible. He also said he despised blacks, and had a special hatred for interracial couples. He has recieved life sentences in Utah and Wisconsin for four murders, an interracial couple in Madison, Wisconsin, and two black men in Salt Lake City who were jogging with two white women.
In what's becoming a semi-annual event, on January, 1998, Joe admitted to killing an interracial couple as they walked down a street in 1980. A compulsive confessor, Franklin convinced investigators that he is the one who shot Arthur Smothers, 22, and Kathleen Mikula, 16. In a purely random killing, Joe snipped at the youngster as they were crossing a bridge in Johnston, about 60 miles east of Pittsburg. "He gave us information that could only be supplied by the perpetrator that was never in the paper that corroborated the physical evidence," District Attorney David Tulowitzki said. "He's not remorseful," Johnstown police Chief Robert Huntley said. "You could actually see him get excited when he described the murders. ... He gets louder and he gets a little fidgety in the chair."
On March 4, 1998, Franklin pleaded guilty to the 1978 murder of a black man in Chattanooga. He admitted to shooting William Tatum outside a Chattanooga restaurant because Tatum was with a white woman. According to Assistant District Attorney General Joseph Rehyansky, Franklin -- who he calls a "homicidal moron" -- has undergone "some sort of bizarre religious conversion." A believer in numerology, he demanded the court hearing be on the fourht, because the day -- the 63rd of the year -- corresponded with his favorite number -- 3.
On April 2, 1998, Franklin -- apparently drunk on confession juice -- admitted to the 1979 slayings of Mercedes Lynn Masters, 15, and restaurant manager Harold McIver, 27. DeKalb County District Attorney J. Tom Morgan called Franklin "the most evil individual I have ever come across," and said the killings were motivated by racial hatred. In the jailhouse confession, Franklin said he had a sexual relationship with Mercedes, who was white, and killed her after she told him she had sex with blacks. He said he gunned down McIver -- who was black -- because he worked with young, white girls at a Taco Bell, and thought he would hit on them.
Morgan told WSB-TV in Atlanta that his office was told about 10 days ago that Franklin might be willing to talk, demanding "at attractive white female investigator." He wished for a Jodie Foster type to interview him like in the film "The Silence of the Lambs." |
