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#1
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11-20-2013, 10:42 AM
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Joseph Franklin, White Supremacist Serial Killer, Executed
A US white supremacist who targeted black and Jewish people in a nationwide killing spree has been put to death in the US state of Missouri. Joseph Franklin was executed for shooting dead a man and wounding two others outside a synagogue in 1977. The 63-year-old was convicted of seven other racially motivated murders. He claimed to have committed 20 in total. His execution came after the US Supreme Court upheld an appeal court's decision to lift a stay of execution. Racist views 'renounced' In 1978 Franklin shot Hustler publisher Larry Flynt, leaving him partially paralysed, after seeing a picture of a mixed-race couple in one of his magazines. But Mr Flynt - who opposes the death penalty - had sued to prevent Franklin's execution. Franklin declined to make a final statement and was pronounced dead at 6:17 local time (12:17 GMT) on Wednesday. An Associated Press news agency journalist said that Franklin swallowed hard as 5g of pentobarbital were administered. It took him 10 minutes to be pronounced dead. In an interview with the St Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper published on Monday, Franklin said he had renounced his racist views. He said his motivation had been "illogical" and was partly a consequence of an abusive upbringing. He said he had interacted with black people in prison, adding: "I saw they were people just like us." Franklin, who defence lawyers said was a paranoid schizophrenic, bombed a synagogue in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in July 1977. No-one was injured in that attack. Sniper attacks He committed his first murder shortly after arriving in St Louis later that year, picking out the Brith Sholom Kneseth Israel synagogue from the phone book. Franklin opened fire on the place of worship as guests were leaving a bar mitzvah on 8 October 1977, killing Gerald Gordon, 42. It was for this murder that he was sentenced to death. He continued sniper attacks over three years, killing two black teenagers in Ohio and an interracial couple in Wisconsin. Franklin was finally caught after killing two young black men who were about to go jogging with teenage white girls in Salt Lake City, Utah, in August 1980. He also admitted the attempted murder of African-American civil rights leader Vernon Jordan outside an Indiana hotel in May 1980. Franklin robbed up to 16 banks to fund his activities. His lawyers' appeal focused partly on a dispute over the type of lethal injections that Missouri uses in its executions. US and EU manufacturers have been cutting off the supply of drugs used for lethal injections in recent years in an attempt to distance themselves from executions. Mein Kampf inspiration The single drug used in the execution of Franklin was pentobarbital, a short-acting barbiturate that can induce death in high doses. This was the first time the sedative has been used for this purpose in Missouri. The state had to abandon its previous drug of choice, propofol, when it appeared the European Union might issue an export ban to prevent its use in lethal injections. On Tuesday, Franklin's lawyers won a stay of execution when they argued in federal court that using this drug would violate the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. But early on Wednesday, a federal appeals court overturned the stay of execution. Its ruling was upheld by the US Supreme Court, sealing Franklin's fate less than an hour later. In the 1960s, Franklin was inspired to try to start a race war after reading Adolf Hitler's political manifesto Mein Kampf. "I've never felt that way about any other book that I read," he would reflect later. "It was something weird about that book." |
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#3
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11-20-2013, 09:22 PM
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Re: Joseph Franklin, White Supremacist Serial Killer, Executed
Wow! Thanks, Johnny! I never knew the reason Larry was shot I thought it was just a guy who thought his magazines were obscene Is Franklin the guy who found out recently he was something like 14% black? |
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#4
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11-20-2013, 11:12 PM
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Re: Joseph Franklin, White Supremacist Serial Killer, Executed
(from: http://www.businessinsider.com/josep...erview-2013-11) Right Before His Execution, A Serial Killer Explained Why He Shot Porn Mogul Larry Flynt Erin Fuchs Nov. 20, 2013, 9:34 AMAP Photo/St. Louis Post-Dispatch [IMG]https://i.huffpost.com/gen/1470206/thumbs/n-JOSEPH-PAUL-FRANKLIN-large570.jpg?6/IMG] Joseph Paul Franklin in court in 1997 Serial killer Joseph Paul Franklin gave an interview to CNN the week of his execution, during which he explained why he killed 22 people and shot and paralyzed Hustler founder Larry Flynt. Franklin, a 63-year-old white supremacist, told CNN that the purpose of his killing spree — which included the murder of two young black teenage boys — was to "get a race war started." His enemies were Jews, blacks, and interracial couples. That last enemy is why Franklin targeted Hustler publisher Larry Flynt. Franklin was enraged by the 1975 issue of Hustler that featured a black man with a white woman. "It just made me sick. I think whites marry with whites, blacks with blacks, Indians with Indians. Orientals with orientals," Franklin told CNN. "I threw the magazine down and thought, I'm gonna kill that guy." Franklin shot Flynt in 1978 in Lawrenceville, Ga., where the Hustler publisher was facing trial for obscenity. (Flynt was the target of many legal actions and inspired the 1996 Woody Harrelson movie "The People Versus Larry Flynt.") Flynt survived the shooting but was paralyzed from the waist down. Flynt has spoken out against his attacker's execution. "I would love an hour in a room with him and a pair of wire-cutters and pliers, so I could inflict the same damage on him that he inflicted on me," Flynt wrote in an opinion column for the Hollywood Reporter. "But, I do not want to kill him, nor do I want to see him die." Despite Flynt's protests, the state of Missouri killed Franklin by lethal injection on Wednesday morning. Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/josep...#ixzz2lFVazpOK |
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#5
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11-21-2013, 12:48 AM
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Re: Joseph Franklin, White Supremacist Serial Killer, Executed
Thanks, IC! I thought I was the only one who never knew. That wacko looks like that guy, Ronald Alcala, from The Dating Game who murdered a bunch of women! · |
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#6
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11-21-2013, 08:49 AM
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Re: Joseph Franklin, White Supremacist Serial Killer, Executed
"I would love an hour in a room with him and a pair of wire-cutters and pliers, so I could inflict the same damage on him that he inflicted on me," Flynt wrote in an opinion column for the Hollywood Reporter. "But, I do not want to kill him, nor do I want to see him die." I love this. Should start doing the exact things to criminals as they've done to their victims. |