Tag: georgia death row

David Franks Georgia Death Row

david franks

David Franks was sentenced to death by the State of Georgia for three murders. According to court documents David Franks would shoot and kill two people inside of a pawn shop. David Franks would drive to the victims home and would force the next victim to reveal a hidden a safe, Franks would fatally stab the victim. David Franks would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death.

Georgia Death Row Inmate List

David Franks 2021 Information

YOB: 1961
RACE: WHITE
GENDER: MALE
HEIGHT: 6’00”
WEIGHT: 240
EYE COLOR: BROWN
HAIR COLOR: BROWN

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: GA DIAG CLASS PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: DEATH

David Franks More News

The evidence at trial showed that David Franks was an acquaintance and occasional business associate of Clinton Wilson, the husband of the murder victim.   On the morning of August 5, 1994, Clinton Wilson and David Martin visited Franks’s pawn shop in Haralson County.   The next day, Wilson and Martin were found shot to death on the bottom floor of Franks’s pawn shop.2  They had been shot with a nine-millimeter pistol.   The medical examiner testified that the upward trajectory of the bullet wounds in the bodies was consistent with the two victims being shot from behind while lying face-down.

After killing Martin and Wilson, David Franks took Wilson’s white “cube” van and drove to Hall County to Wilson’s house, where Franks believed that Wilson had secretly hidden tens of thousands of dollars.   The Wilsons’ nine-year-old daughter Jessica answered the door and invited Franks into the home.   Franks told Clinton’s wife, Debbie Wilson, that he was looking for Clinton and waited with her in the kitchen.   At approximately 1:30 p.m., Debbie telephoned David Martin’s wife and asked her if she had seen Clinton because “the other David” was at her house looking for him.   About this time, the Wilsons’ thirteen-year-old son, Brian, returned home, but then left again with a friend.

When David Franks said he wanted to go fishing, Debbie sent Jessica to retrieve Brian.   While the children were gone, Franks pulled a gun on Debbie and forced her to the upstairs bedroom, where he knew a safe was located.   After retrieving money from the safe, Franks stabbed Debbie Wilson in the back and went downstairs to await the children’s return.   After Franks went downstairs, Debbie called 911, identified her attacker as “David Franks” several times, and stated that he assaulted her for money.   She also reported this information to the paramedics who arrived to treat her.   She went into cardiac arrest due to blood loss and died before reaching the hospital.

When the children returned to the house, David Franks asked Jessica to go to the van and get a briefcase for him, and he told Brian to fetch fishing gear so they could go fishing.   While Brian was getting his fishing rod, Franks attacked him from behind and slashed his throat.   Brian managed to fight back, cutting Franks on the left arm. Franks then left Brian and stabbed Jessica as she came back in the house.   Brian and Jessica were able to escape and run to a neighbor’s house;  they both survived.   Brian and Jessica told the neighbor that their father’s friend “David” had attacked them and that he was driving a white cube van.   They also described Franks’s physical appearance.   Later, at the hospital, the children each picked Franks out of a photo lineup.   At trial, they identified Franks as their attacker.   DNA taken from two bloodstains in the Wilsons’ house matched Franks’s DNA.

David Franks fled the Wilsons’ house in the white cube van.   Two firefighters responding to the 911 calls observed the van, which had been described on the radio, driving away from the Wilsons’ house.   They testified that there was a lone man fitting Franks’s description driving it.   The police found the van abandoned about nine miles away.   In and around the van the police found a knife, a blood-stained shirt that Franks had been seen wearing that day, and a bloodstain on the left armrest of the van’s driver’s seat.   A forensic chemist from the state crime lab found that DNA from blood on the shirt and armrest matched Franks’s DNA. A canine unit tracked Franks’s scent from the abandoned van to a nearby house that had been burglarized.   The homeowner’s Mazda 626 and some clothes had been stolen.

David Franks drove the stolen Mazda 626 to Biloxi, Mississippi, and gambled several thousand dollars over a three-day period in a casino. From the casino, he obtained a player’s advantage card, in the name of “Ty Dare.” A casino surveillance videotape from August 8, 1994, depicts Franks playing blackjack.   Franks then traveled to Mobile, Alabama, and checked into a motel under the name Ty Dare. A Mobile police officer spotted the Mazda 626 in the motel parking lot and responding police officers found, in the room registered to Ty Dare, a nine-millimeter handgun, cash, keys to the Mazda 626, recently purchased clothes, a jacket emblazoned with the name of the Biloxi casino where Franks had been observed gambling, a belt with a letter “D” belt buckle, cowboy boots similar to boots worn by Franks on August 5, and a wallet containing Franks’s driver’s license, social security card, and a casino player’s advantage card in the name of Ty Dare. The boots and belt had human bloodstains on them but the amount was insufficient for DNA analysis.   Franks’s girlfriend, Frankie Watts, identified the handgun as similar to the nine-millimeter handgun owned by Franks.3  The Mazda 626 contained Franks’s fingerprints and a bloodstain that matched his DNA. Franks observed the police activity at the motel when he was returning on foot and he fled the scene.4

On August 14, 1994, the police arrested Franks at a relative’s house in Alabama in possession of a .22 caliber derringer.   He had a bandaged cut on his left arm.   Before his arrest, he told his relatives that the pawn shop victims were supposed to come up with $100,000 to buy drugs but they did not have the money.   He told his brother-in-law that he had an altercation with them and had made them lie on the floor before shooting them;  he also said the pawn shop victims “got what they deserved.”   The State presented evidence that Franks had promised to pay cash to a car dealer on the day of the murders for a Lincoln Town Car he had obtained two days before.   There was also evidence that he and his girlfriend planned to close a transaction on some property in Alabama shortly after the murders.   At trial, Franks admitted being present at both murder scenes during the killings, but he claimed that other men, who were drug dealers, had killed the victims.

After reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury’s determination of guilt, we conclude that any rational trier of fact could have found Franks guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the crimes for which he was convicted.5  The evidence was also sufficient to authorize the jury to find beyond a reasonable doubt the statutory aggravating circumstances that supported his death sentence for the murder of Debbie Wilson.6

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ga-supreme-court/1197662.html

John Esposito Georgia Death Row

john esposito

John Esposito was sentenced to death by the State of Georgia for the murders of three elderly people. According to court documents John Esposito and his girlfriend Alicia Woodward would beat to death a ninety year old woman and then a week later beat to death an elderly couple in Oklahoma, John Esposito would be sentenced to death

Georgia Death Row Inmate List

John Esposito 2021 Information

YOB: 1975
RACE: WHITE
GENDER: MALE
HEIGHT: 5’08”
WEIGHT: 200
EYE COLOR: BLUE
HAIR COLOR: BROWN

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: GA DIAG CLASS PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: DEATH

John Esposito More News

The evidence adduced at trial, including testimony recounting Esposito’s confession to federal authorities, showed that on September 19, 1996, Esposito’s co-conspirator, Alicia Woodward, persuaded Lola Davis to give her a ride from a parking lot in Lumberton, North Carolina.   Woodward directed Davis to a nearby location where Esposito entered Davis’ automobile.   Esposito and Woodward then forced the elderly Davis, without the use of any weapons, to drive to a nearby parking lot and to move to the passenger seat of her automobile.   John Esposito removed one thousand dollars and Davis’ checkbook from her purse, and Woodward drove Davis’ automobile to a local bank where she cashed a check for three hundred dollars that she and Esposito had forced Davis to write.   Woodward and Esposito then drove Davis to a remote location in Morgan County, Georgia, where Esposito led Davis into a hayfield, forced her to kneel, and beat her to death with tree limbs and other debris.   John Esposito and Woodward then drove in Davis’ automobile to Alabama where they disposed of Davis’ automobile and purse.   Davis’ automobile was shown at trial to contain fingerprints, palm prints, and footprints matching Esposito’s and Woodward’s.   Saliva on a cigarette butt found in the automobile was shown to contain DNA consistent with Esposito’s DNA.

Evidence presented during the sentencing phase showed that, after murdering Davis, Esposito and Woodward traveled to Oklahoma, abducted an elderly couple, illegally obtained money using the couple’s bank card, and then drove the couple to Texas where Esposito beat them to death with a tire iron.   An FBI agent also testified during the sentencing phase that Esposito had described his and Woodward’s plan to abduct and murder yet another elderly woman for money.

We find that the evidence adduced at trial, viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict, was sufficient to authorize a rational trier of fact to find beyond a reasonable doubt that Esposito was guilty of the crimes of which he was convicted and that statutory aggravating circumstances existed.2

 2. Esposito contends that the trial court erred by denying his motion to suppress a confession he made to two FBI agents during an interview conducted on the night of his arrest.   We find no error.

Testimony heard by the trial court showed that John Esposito and Woodward were observed unlawfully possessing a BB gun in Colorado’s Mesa Verde National Park by a park ranger.   Esposito was uncooperative when instructed to lay down the gun, and the park ranger called for assistance.   Park rangers determined that the automobile Esposito and Woodward were driving had been reported missing under suspicious circumstances and that there was a warrant for their arrest.   At approximately 3:00 p.m., a park ranger informed Esposito that he was under arrest and gave the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona.3  As each portion of his Miranda warnings was read, Esposito stated “yeah” and nodded affirmatively.   Esposito was then asked if he understood his warnings, but, before he answered, the park ranger stated that he had no questions for Esposito.   Persons who observed Esposito testified that he did not appear to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

Later that evening, two FBI agents arrived at the jail where Esposito and Woodward were being held, interviewed Woodward first, and then interviewed Esposito from 11:35 p.m. until 12:22 a.m.   According to testimony by one of the FBI agents, Esposito was asked before being questioned if he remembered and understood the warnings he had received earlier that day, particularly the warning that he was not required to speak with authorities.   Esposito responded that he was willing to make a statement.

The lapse of eleven and one half hours between Esposito’s receiving his Miranda warnings and making his confession did not render the confession inadmissible.4  Esposito’s reliance on Riley v. State5 is misplaced, as we have explicitly held that Riley is not applicable to adults.6  Upon our review of the record, we conclude that the trial court’s findings of fact were not clearly erroneous, and, upon our de novo application of those findings of fact to the law, we conclude that the trial court’s legal conclusion regarding the confession’s admissibility was correct.7

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ga-supreme-court/1059999.html

Alicia Woodward 2021 Information

alicia woodward

YOB: 1977
RACE: WHITE
GENDER: FEMALE
HEIGHT: 5’07”
WEIGHT: 230
EYE COLOR: BROWN
HAIR COLOR: SLT&PEP

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: PULASKI STATE PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: LIFE

David Edenfield Georgia Death Row

david edenfield

David Edenfield was sentenced to death by the State of Georgia for the sexual assault and murder of a six year old boy. According to court documents David Edenfield would abduct Christopher Barrios Jr on March 8, 2007 his body would be found seven days later. He had been sexually assaulted and murdered. David Edenfield who was a convicted child molester was arrested the next day. He would be convicted and sentenced to death.

Georgia Death Row Inmate List

David Edenfield 2021 Information

YOB: 1948
RACE: WHITE
GENDER: MALE
HEIGHT: 5’06”
WEIGHT: 160
EYE COLOR: BROWN
HAIR COLOR: GRAY

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: GA DIAG CLASS PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: DEATH

David Edenfield More News

It took a jury two hours Tuesday to decide to return a death penalty sentence against convicted murderer and child molester David Edenfield, 61, of Glynn County.

Edenfield was convicted Monday in Glynn County Superior Court for his role in multiple crimes that resulted in the death of Christopher Michael Barrios Jr., 6, March 8, 2007.

Edenfield was the first of three people charged in Christopher’s death to be tried. His wife, Peggy Edenfield, and adult son, George Edenfield, have also been charged. No trial date has been set for either.

Christopher’s family members were visibly relieved after the death sentence was handed down and held a press conference on the steps of the Glynn County Courthouse afterward.

Sue Rodriguez, Christopher’s grandmother, said Christopher finally received justice, but she won’t rest until all involved have been brought to trial. “We’ve got two more,” she said.

Rodriguez said she plans to attend Edenfield’s execution, which could be years away.

Showing those gathered a pendant engraved with an image of Christopher that she wears close to her heart, Rodriguez said the young boy is always with her.

Michael Barrios, Rodriguez’s son and Christopher’s father, said he was happy with the jury’s decision and said Christopher is “smiling down from heaven.”

“I’ve felt him with me today,” Barrios said.

Barrios said that he and his family plan to attend the two remaining trials. “We’re holding up our end of the bargain,” he said. “We’ve had (Christopher’s) back the entire time.”

Barrios also plans to attend Edenfield’s execution.

He admitted to being a little nervous about the outcome of the case, but said that Edenfield’s confession during a police interrogation March 16, 2007, “sealed his deal.”

“This sentence that we got is exactly what I wanted,” Barrios said.

Glynn County District Attorney Stephen Kelley, who prosecuted the case with Assistant District Attorney John B. Johnson, said he was satisfied with the outcome. “I wanted justice for Christopher,” Kelley said.

John Beall IV, one of Edenfield’s court-appointed defense attorneys, told the jury in statements Tuesday that no matter how they voted to sentence Edenfield, the result would be the same.

“David Homer Edenfield is going to die in prison, and that’s a fact,” Beall stated. “And Christopher is not going to come back.”

Beall pleaded with the jury to be merciful and to consider the burden of deciding to execute another human being.

“Sometimes it’s hard to consider mercy, even when it’s the law,” he said. “You will be living with this decision for the rest of your life.”

Kelley, presenting the state’s closing argument, reminded the jury it had three sentences to consider – death, life without parole and life with the possibility of parole.

“Justice demands the ultimate penalty when it fits the crime,” Kelley said.

Kelley told jurors that while Edenfield was “not the sharpest tack in the box,” he knew right from wrong at the time Christopher was killed. Becoming increasingly impassioned, he told jurors that Edenfield was the architect of this crime.

“Some things are just imcomprehensible,” Kelley said. “A slippery slope of sexual perversion gave way to a malignant heart – or maybe he’s just rotten from the inside out.”

Kelley called the crimes against Christopher outrageous, heinous, senseless and tragic, and urged the jury not to pity Edenfield.

Although sentenced to die, it will be some time before Edenfield faces lethal injection.

Russ Willard, director of communications for the Georgia Attorney General’s Office, said Tuesday the amount of time inmates spend on death row before their sentence is carried out varies widely from case to case. Willard said the specifics of the case, the time the conviction occurred and the judge overseeing the case all play a role in determining how long the condemned sit on death row before appealing for a lighter sentence or being executed.

Willard said there are many different appellate avenues convicts can take to postpone their sentence, and all of them take considerable time to move through the legal system.

“You’re probably looking at eight to 10 years as the earliest you’ll ever see any condemned actually being executed,” Willard said.

There are currently 107 inmates on death row in Georgia.

Punishment:

After the jury handed down the death sentence Tuesday on the murder conviction of David Edenfield, Glynn County Superior Court Judge Stephen G. Scarlett meted out the maximum penalties on the remaining charges. Scarlett ordered all charges to be served consecutively. In addition to the death sentence, Edenfield received two life sentences, and an additional combined total of 63 years:

* Two counts of aggravated child molestation – one life sentence for each.

* One count of child molestation – 20 years imprisonment.

* One count of cruelty to children in the first degree – 20 years.

* One count of false imprisonment – 10 years.

* One count of concealing the death of a person – 10 years.

* One count of tampering with evidence – 3 years.

https://thebrunswicknews.com/news/local_news/edenfield-sentenced-to-death/article_db3e0718-2ce2-5d25-a84d-bfbf575a830e.html

Leonard Drane Georgia Death Row

leonard drane

Leonard Drane was sentenced to death by the State of Georgia for the sexual assault and murder of a woman. According to court documents Leonard Drane and his roommate David Robert Willis met the victim outside of a liquor store and she asked the men for crack cocaine. The three of them would travel to a nearby lake where the woman was sexually assaulted, shot in the head and had her throat slit. Leonard Drane would blame David Robert Willis for the murder however it would be Drane who was sentenced to death and David Willis would receive a life sentence

Georgia Death Row Inmate List

Leonard Drane 2021 Information

YOB: 1959
RACE: WHITE
GENDER: MALE
HEIGHT: 5’09”
WEIGHT: 160
EYE COLOR: BLUE
HAIR COLOR: BROWN

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: GA DIAG CLASS PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: DEATH

Leonard Drane More News

A jury convicted Leonard Drane of malice murder, felony murder, and aggravated battery, and imposed a death sentence for the malice murder.   The evidence adduced at trial showed that Leonard Drane and co-indictee David Willis picked up Renee Blackmon on June 13, 1990, and drove her to a secluded road.   Ms. Blackmon’s body was found in a lake on July 1, 1990.   She had been shot point-blank in the head with a shotgun and her throat had been cut at least six times.   She was tied to a brake drum with a rope.   After his arrest, Drane claimed that Willis had sex with the victim and shot her with a shotgun, and then cut her throat because she was still breathing.   Leonard Drane said he did not know Willis was going to kill the victim and he did not participate in her killing.   However, he admitted helping Willis dispose of the body, hide the gun, wash Willis’s truck, and burn their clothes;  and that he continued to live with Willis for three weeks until their arrest.   He claimed he did so because he was afraid of Willis.

At trial, a witness testified that Leonard Drane told her prior to his arrest that he and Willis “picked this [black] girl up at the Huddle House in Elberton, Georgia, and that it would be the last ride she’d ever take.” 1  He further said he “[had sex with] her so bad that she’d never have any more babies” and that he and Willis threw her in the lake.   He said the only mistake he made was to put one block on her instead of two (the body had just been discovered).   Another witness testified that Drane told him he cut the victim’s throat because she was still alive after Willis shot her.   On the night of the murder, after Willis and Leonard Drane had disposed of the victim’s body, they went to a bar and met some women.   They went with the women to a trailer, where they drank beer and made comments about hating blacks.   One of the women noticed that the men, who were not wearing shirts, had scratches on their chests.   In the penalty phase, one of the women testified that Drane forced her to orally sodomize him at knife point that same night.

https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ga-supreme-court/1140545.html

Cleveland Clark Georgia Death Row

cleveland clark

Cleveland Clark was sentenced to death by the State of Georgia for a contract killing. According to court documents Cleveland Clark was paid ten thousand dollars to murder Sparkle Rai. Police reports Chiman Rai paid Cleveland to kill his daughter in law for he did not want his son married to an African American woman. Shorty after her marriage Sparkle Rai would be murdered by strangulation with a vacuum cord in front of her daughter. Chiman Rai would receive a life without parole prison sentence. Cleveland Clark was sentenced to death

Georgia Death Row Inmate List

Cleveland Clark 2021 Information

YOB: 1957
RACE: BLACK
GENDER: MALE
HEIGHT: 6’01”
WEIGHT: 297
EYE COLOR: BROWN
HAIR COLOR: BLACK

MAJOR OFFENSE: MURDER
MOST RECENT INSTITUTION: GA DIAG CLASS PRISON
MAX POSSIBLE RELEASE DATE: DEATH

Cleveland Clark More News

Sparkle Rai’s father Bennet Reid wiped away a tear Thursday evening when he heard the sentence.

“Death,” the forewoman read from a Fulton County jury box, condemning Cleveland Clark, the man convicted of murdering Reid’s daughter.

Donna Lowery, Rai’s stepmother, let out a tremendous sigh.

Then, it was Clark’s turn to hear his fate. Cleveland, who had made several outbursts during the two-week trial and sentencing hearings, was led into the courtroom in shackles.

Judge T. Jackson Bedford then repeated the sentence with Cleveland present. This time, Clark showed little emotion until he was led out of the courtroom. He glared at the jury.

The same Fulton County jury that last Friday convicted Clark of murdering Rai, decided Thursday he should die by legal injection. Cleveland, 52, stabbed and strangled Rai with a vacuum cleaner chord in front of her crying 6-month-old daughter for $10,000.

“I feel like a big burden has been lifted from my shoulders,” Bennet said after the sentencing. “I really believe that Sparkle has seen this happen, and she’s smiling down.”

He and Lowery exchanged hugs with other loved ones in the courtroom.

“I think they truly saw what type of an evil man he really is,” Lowery said of the jury’s death sentence.

Rai’s father-in-law, Chiman Rai, a native of India, wanted Rai dead because he opposed his son marrying an African-American woman. Sparkle, then 22, and Rajeeve “Ricky” Rai had been married a month when she was murdered.

Clark was the last of those implicated in Rai’s death.

Chiman Rai, 68, was sentenced in 2008 to life in prison without the possibility of parole for hiring Clark to kill Sparkle Rai.

Two other men — the links between Chiman Rai and Clark — each were sentenced to 10 months’ probation because they helped prosecutors bring cases against the father-in-law and Clark.

The 6-3, nearly 300-pound Clark’s volatile personality showed Thursday in an obscenity-filled rant that led Bedford to clear the jury and the prisoner from the courtroom.

“I said I didn’t kill no … woman,” Cleveland said, pounding a table with his fist. “What’s wrong with you? I’m sick of this … telling lies on me.”

Asked after the hearing to compare Clark’s death penalty to the life without parole outcome of convicted multiple killer Brian Nichols, Fulton County prosecutor Kellie Hill said Clark “sealed his own fate” with his outbursts.

“The jury got to see the killer that Sparkle got to face,” Hill said.

https://www.ajc.com/news/local/tears-relief-sparkle-rai-killer-gets-death-sentence/Ql0GjR49DkzRVHe6M75NmI/