Prosecutors to seek death penalty in ‘Grim Sleeper’ case
Lonnie Franklin Jr.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—Prosecutors will seek the death penalty against the man suspected in the “Grim Sleeper” serial killings, a deputy district attorney announced today.
A jury will be asked to recommend a death sentence for 58-year-old Lonnie Franklin Jr. if he is convicted, Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman said. Franklin has been indicted on 10 counts of murder and one count of attempted murder.
Franklin, a one-time city employee, has been locked up since his July 7, 2010, arrest.
He is charged with killing the women, many of them prostitutes, and dumping their remains in alleys and trash bins around South Los Angeles between 1985 and 2007.
Franklin was initially dubbed the "Grim Sleeper" due to a large gap between groups of killings, but detectives said they now don’t think there was a long delay between murders.
A former city sanitation worker and onetime Los Angeles Police Department garage attendant, Franklin was known in his South Los Angeles neighborhood as a backyard mechanic who often helped with residents’ auto problems.
His alleged victims were black women who were usually sexually assaulted before their deaths, police said.
Authorities have said that one particular handgun was used in many of the killings.
Franklin was linked to the killings after his son was arrested in 2008 on gun and drug charges.
The younger Franklin submitted a DNA sample, which was connected to the alleged "Grim Sleeper’s" DNA.
During an OurWeekly interview back in November of last year, “800” Task Force member Det. Bill Fallon suggested that more victims of suspected “Grim Sleeper” mass murderer Lonnie David Franklin, Jr. might materialize, adding to the 10 already ascribed to one of the most prolific serial killings in Los Angeles crime history.
Although Lonnie Franklin, the defendant in the Grim Sleeper murders that plagued South Los Angeles over the past two decades, has been in custody for more than three months, the “800” Task Force charged with solving the carnage is still embroiled in the investigation, according to Bill Fallon, one of the eight officers assigned to the investigative unit. The detective granted Our Weekly an interview in between treks to Mississippi and Northern California to tie up loose ends in this ever-expanding multiple homicide case.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—Eight more women may have been killed by the 'Grim Sleeper,' an alleged serial killer charged with killing 10 women in South Los Angeles as far back as the mid 1980s.
Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck plans to discuss the case and release images of possible victims at a 4 p.m. news conference.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—A grand jury indictment was unsealed today against the suspected "Grim Sleeper'' serial killer, who is accused of murdering 10 women and trying to kill an 11th victim in a crime spree that stretched over more than two decades.
The indictment, returned Wednesday and unsealed this afternoon by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia M. Schnegg, contains the same charges filed last summer against Lonnie David Franklin Jr.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—About 20 women depicted in 180 photos retrieved from the home of the "Grim Sleeper'' serial-killer suspect have been identified by detectives, and most are alive and well, police said today.
Police released 180 photos Thursday in hopes of identifying the people in them and ensuring they were not possible victims of the "Grim Sleeper.''
The photos were found in the South Los Angeles home of suspect Lonnie David Franklin Jr.
