Rape Victim’s Family Speaks About Attack

    A 21-year-old woman who says she was raped by a suspected serial killer plans to testify against him.  That’s according to her sister, who spoke exclusively to News Channel 12.  38-year-old Ricky Franklin is accused of brutally beating and raping the young woman.
    We’re not using her real name to protect her identity.
    According to the family, the young woman knew Franklin who was trying to date her roommate.  They say Franklin picked up the 21-year-old at her home Saturday night and took her to Dick’s Place, a bar in Bolton.  When he was taking her back home, he reportedly said he had to make a quick stop at his house.  Once there, she says he immediately started beating her, then raped her. 
    She passed out and woke up at University Medical Center.  According to the victim’s sister, who we’ll call “Sue,“ her little sister has a broken nose and jaw, a swollen eye, and bruises from the beating.  She says the rape was savage.
    “Her nose was bleeding, and she said he was over her licking the blood from her nose saying, ‘I’m a beat you…I ain’t going to kill you, but I’m a beat you.“
    Using a glass bottle and his fist, she says Ricky Franklin knocked her little sister out.
    When asked if her sister worked as a prostitute: “Not prostitution, I don’t think she would do that.“
    “Sue” says her sister has a boyfriend and says though she can’t hide the physical scars, she’s trying to hide the emotional ones.
    Franklin has a long rap sheet and a checkered past.  “Sue” is frustrated investigators can’t connect him to four bodies found buried near his home a decade ago.
    “Somebody speak up because he deserves to be behind bars,“ she said. 
    Hinds County District Attorney Robert Smith is asking for the public’s help with these cold cases.
  “If there are other cases, or information on those cases, eyewitnesses who can provide information, we’ll be happy to take a look at those cases,“ he said.
    Franklin’s criminal history started more than a decade ago.
    He’s been arrested 11 times, many for violent crimes.
    In 2006, he was arrested and charged with capital murder, but the D.A. dropped the case because of a lack of evidence.