How Could You? Hall of Shame-Samuel and Diana Franklin UPDATED

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

From Butler, Georgia, adoptive parents Samuel and Diana Franklin were arrested for child abuse against their 15-year-old adopted daughter. Some news outlets still do not mention that she is adopted. Initial stories did not mention that she was adopted. WTVM says that “Diana Franklin is facing 12 counts of cruelty to children and 4 counts of false imprisonment. Samuel Franklin has been charged with 8 counts of cruelty to children and 8 counts of false imprisonment. “ They are alleged to have placed a shocking dog collar on their daughter and to have kept her in a chicken coop for punishment. Their attorney denies all allegations.

The incident report from May 2012 can be seen at http://www.scribd.com/doc/95471407/Taylor-County-SO-Incident-Report

WTVM says “According to agents at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, the 15-year-old girl told authorities a shock collar for dogs was placed around her neck and used on her several times. Investigators say a remote key fob was used to shock the girl at will by anyone in control of the collar.

Agents were not able to find the collar during their initial search of the home in June, but when Debra and Samuel Franklin were arrested Tuesday morning, officials found the collar in the home.

Agents say the collar confiscated from the Franklin’s home matches the description of the device that their daughter gave to authorities during an interview.

GBI agents told us that the shock collar and a leather belt were sent off to the state crime lab for DNA testing.

David Spillers lives down the road from the Franklins. He has witnessed their daughter working in the hot sun.

“I saw her when she was out in the yard working in that garden out there and I saw her around picking up trash in the yard,” Spillers said.

Another neighbor who did not want to go on camera told us that Diana Franklin would often punish her daughter for not doing chores and working the “right way.”

The neighbor said that Diana Franklin would only feed her daughter bread and water as punishment for days on end. The neighbor says that Diana Franklin told her that she was “doing what the Bible says.” [I hope that you were the one that called CPS on them! If not, YOU are also to blame for continuing this cruelty!}

“Mrs. Franklin hasn’t denied none of it and I know it there is no doubt in my mind that she was mistreating that girl,” Spillers said.

A juvenile court custody hearing for the Franklin’s 15-year-old daughter will take place Thursday morning in Taylor County. Once the investigation is completed by the GBI, it will be handed over to District Attorney Julia Slater.”

Another WTVM article states “One neighbor told WTVM the 15-year-old girl was disciplined and forced to stay in a small red chicken coop behind the house, only to be moved to a workshop building when her behavior improved.

Several neighbors and witnesses said they watched the girl performing heavy manual labor including large rocks, for hours, in the extreme heat.”I’ve seen her out working in the gardens, digging ditches in the hot sun with two or three older boys watching her. I’ve seen her toting rocks up the road – she looked like she was in rough shape, “said Steven Balis.”

The June 1, 2012 WTVM article states that “The Butler, GA family, who neighbors told authorities pad-locked their daughter in an outdoor building without food and water, may have also done the same thing over three years ago in another county.

We went to Roberta, Georgia, the town where the family lived 3 years ago. A neighbor told us she had her suspicions about the family when one day, she says, the girl walked over to her house, knocked on the door and said, “Please help me. I haven’t eaten in three days.”

The woman said she began to cook for the girl, but was interrupted, when Diana Franklin, the girl’s mother, grabbed the girl and according to the neighbor yelled, “You can’t eat if you don’t work.” [So that neighbor ALSO did not report them? THREE years ago this could have been stopped!]

Daily Mail adds “GBI’s Wayne Smith told WSB radio  in Atlanta: ‘The child basically said that there were just a series of fairly severe,         what can be described as punishments, for various things that  the child allegedly did — some as simple as not doing homework  and then others like taking food.'”

Sources:

Couple ‘forced adopted daughter to wear dog shock collar and kept her locked up in a chicken coop’

[Daily Mail 7/12/12 by Phil Vinter]

Chicken coop case: Teen allegedly wore a shock collar

[WTVM 7/11/12 by Fadell Pitts and Curtis McCloud]

Parents arrested, girl allegedly forced to live in chicken coop

[WTVM 7/10/12 by Fadell Pitts]

More details about alleged chicken coop family’s past

[WtVM 6/4/12]

Girl allegedly forced to live in chicken coop

[WTVM 6/1/12]

REFORM Puzzle Pieces

Update: “A 15-year-old Georgia girl told investigators her adoptive parents made her spent days locked inside a small outhouse and chicken coop, wearing a shock collar as punishment for not doing her school work, authorities said Thursday.

Samuel and Diana Franklin were arrested earlier this week on multiple counts of child cruelty and false imprisonment. They were released on bond and left the courthouse Thursday for what appeared to be a custody hearing.

The girl was adopted around 2007 and was home-schooled in a house outside the small town of Butler, about 85 miles south of Atlanta, said Special Agent Wayne Smith of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

The Franklins live on a rural stretch of road sprinkled with a few homes and cow pastures, surrounded by a split-rail fence with prominent “no trespassing” signs at the entrance of the driveway.

Investigation began on May 25 when child welfare agents acted on a tip and visited the home with the sheriff’s department. That same day, Juvenile Court Judge Wayne Jernigan Sr. ordered the teen removed from the home.

The girl told investigators that for the past two years, she spent up to six days at a time in the small buildings behind the property as punishment for things such as failing to complete her school assignments, Smith said.

The buildings included an outhouse, just a few feet high and about 4 feet in length and width, and a red chicken coop, a larger building. Smith said the girl “might come out during the day a little bit, come in and shower.”

“I’ve never seen anything like this personally,” Smith said. “If the allegations prove to be true, it’s a very severe case.”

When the parents were taken into custody on Tuesday, investigators found a dog collar on a table in the home, Smith said. The girl told investigators its shock function was operated by a radio signal with a device, similar to those used to lock and unlock cars remotely. It was being examined at a crime lab.

The girl lived at the home with another sibling, while two older siblings lived away from home. The charges involve only the 15-year-old girl, Smith said, and there are no allegations of abuse involving the other three children.”

Samuel and Diana Franklin Locked Daughter In Chicken Coop, Butler, GA officials said

[WUSA 9 7/13/12 by CBS]

“The parents accused of physically abusing their 15-year-old daughter and locking her in a chicken coop were in juvenile court Thursday.

Diana and Samuel Franklin attended a placement hearing in Taylor County.

Both parties requested a closed hearing Thursday and since it’s a juvenile case the records are sealed. The hearing was intended to be about who should retain custody of the child. She was removed from their Butler home in late May after allegations that they abused her.

Investigators say she is still in the state’s custody.

When officials arrested the Franklins on Tuesday, they found a shock collar inside the home that was allegedly used on the daughter. The victim told investigators during an interview that it was a form of punishment. It has been sent to the crime lab for investigation. Investigators said when the initial search on the house was conducted June 4^th they found receipts for one, but never found it.

The Franklins and their attorney, Kevin Bradley, did not comment after the hearing. The Department of Children and Family Services also declined to say anything.

Several witnesses testified Thursday, and while media wasn’t allowed inside, neighbors outside talked about the case that has the Franklins facing several child cruelty and false imprisonment charges.

They described the situation as disgusting, saying they saw the 15-year-old girl picking up rocks and working in the garden at her home.

One person said the mom only fed her daughter bread and water and Mrs. Franklin said she punished her child because the Bible told her to.

Another remembers talking to the mom, who referred to herself as a woman featured in the Book of Titus, Chapter Two from the Bible.

News Three reached out to the Franklin’s attorney again about the allegations neighbors are making. He has not returned phone calls or e-mail.

Taylor County Sheriff Jeff Watson spoke after the hearing. “You know, court… court is where all the decisions are made as far as the permanent decisions.”

Taylor County Juvenile Court Judge Wayne Jernigan said he is waiting on the criminal charges before he proceeds with the case.

A juvenile court attorney told News Three that usually parents have to go through a reunification process to get their child back and any criminal charges have to be dispelled.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation case is still open and analysis of evidence and more interviews are being done. Once the investigation wraps up, the case will be presented to District Attorney Julia Slater’s office to decide if it will go before a grand jury.

“We’ll start having hearings and the court will take its process and we’ll see how it unfolds,” the sheriff said about the placement hearing.

Diana Franklin is charged with 12 counts of 1^st Degree Cruelty to Children and 4 counts of False Imprisonment. Samuel Franklin is charged with 8 counts of 1^st Degree Cruelty to Children and 8 counts of False Imprisonment.

They made bail the same day they were arrested.

GBI officials said the parents won’t likely be arrested again. The next step would be an indictment.

Special Agent in Charge Wayne Smith, said when he interviewed the girl she seemed to be doing “surprisingly well,”  but added that he was not an official on the matter. Smith said she was polite and respectful and he believed she knew the alleged abuse was “very wrong.”

Taylor Co. parents accused of child cruelty appear in Juvenile Court

[WRBL 7/12/12 by Sydney Cameron]

Update 2:“Troubling allegations of unsanitary living conditions, beatings, and food deprivation continued to emerge Wednesday in a Taylor County trial.

The alleged victim in the case described troubling words that she says her caretaker repeated to her often like “we are stuck with you” and “we don’t love you.”

The now 18-year-old victim who took the stand Wednesday, described extensive abuse she says she endured as a child at the hands of Diana and Samuel Franklin, her adopted parents.

The young woman detailed how she was starved, eventually leading to her resorting to dog food and scraps from a compost containing chicken waste to fight the hunger. She detailed how the unsanitary food made her physically sick.

The victim also described  being locked up in an outdoor shelter with only a shirt and no under garments or pants until her menstruation ended.

She also says she was locked up in various buildings on the family’s property for sometimes days at a time, including a chicken coop that she testifies she was forced to stay in, in cold and hot weather, sometimes even forced to do so naked.

“She said I better be thankful for what I have, and I told her I don’t have anything, and she’s like ‘you have the clothes on your back’ and I said that’s all I have, and she got mad and told me to take it off in the yard and walk to the chicken coop,” she said.

he woman also claims the Franklin’s used a shock collar on her. Statements from the defense imply religious doctrine was the means for how they punished their adopted daughter.

Right now Mrs. Franklin is being tried, in December Mr. Franklin is set to face a jury as well.

The trial will continue once again on Thursday.”

Adoptive daughter testifies in day 2 of chicken coop child abuse case [WTVM 11/12/15 by Emily Arroyo]

“A social worker fought back tears Tuesday as she testified to the state in which she found a 15-year-old girl living in Taylor County, Ga., on May 25, 2012.

Testifying in the child cruelty trial of Diana Franklin, Natrious Jackson said she got a creepy feeling as soon as she and a coworker drove up to Franklin’s 783 Old Wire Road home and saw a cinderblock building with a padlock on the door.

It gave her an eerie feeling because they were there to investigate a tip that a girl was being confined in a locked shed, she said. “I was very uncomfortable,” she testified, adding she felt like horror movie music was playing in her head.

“The hair was standing up on my arm,” she said. “I instantly put my car in reverse.”

She and Sekema Harmon, both working for the Georgia Department of Family and Children Services commonly called DFCS, left the property, parked on the road and called for a Taylor County deputy to accompany them, she said.

When they returned in 15 or 20 minutes with Deputy John Sawyer III, they found the shed unlocked and the doors open, and they saw the girl walking behind it with a white bowl. The bowl turned out to be the chamber pot in which the girl relieved herself while locked in the shed, she said.

Franklin was outside with the teen, and was not happy to hear why they were there, Jackson said.

“She was very irate, very oppositional…. She was just being very belligerent,” Jackson said. They had to threaten to call a judge before Franklin would let Harmon question the girl alone, she said.

When Harmon took the girl into the shed to question her, Franklin tried to get close enough to overhear, Jackson said.

Jackson said she told Franklin they were concerned the girl had been locked in a shed with no air conditioning on a blistering hot day, and that propane, pesticides and other flammable chemicals were stored in the same building.

“She stated that she didn’t see anything wrong with that,” Jackson said.

Inside the shed, they found the girl’s chamber pot and a wastebasket containing used menstrual products and tissues soiled with human waste, she said. The girl’s room had a concrete floor, a single twin-sized bed, a work table and a bench for lifting weights. The room had a window and a fan that wasn’t running, and no air stirred to relieve the stifling heat, she said.

The temperature was in the 90s outside, and worse inside the shed, she said: “It was hotter in there, and it reeked of fumes.”

She said it was about 4 p.m., and Franklin told them the girl had not eaten since 9 a.m. the previous day, and Franklin saw nothing wrong with that because she had not eaten since then, either: “She was defensive, very confrontational…. She didn’t see anything wrong with the way she’d treated the child.”

Jackson described the girl as thin, flushed from the heat, and wearing a T-shirt and shorts too big for her.

Harmon gave a similar description Tuesday: “The child was very thin, frail,” she said, adding the girl looked frightened.

Harmon said Franklin told them the family didn’t have room for the girl in the two-bedroom house she and her husband shared with their sons. The girl had slept in the parents’ room before they moved her outside for privacy, Harmon said.

She said the girl told her of being locked in the shed for up to two weeks at a time, of being compelled to haul rocks from one place on the property to another, and of having her hair cut off as punishment for misbehavior.

The DFCS workers decided to take the girl from Franklin’s custody immediately. When the girl got into their car, she expressed relief at having been rescued, Harmon said: “She said, ‘Thank you for saving my life,’ and ‘What took you so long?’”

Jackson recalled that the girl seemed famished, and gobbled down the snacks and drink they bought her afterward.

She said DFCS later arranged two meetings with Franklin, her husband Samuel Franklin and the girl. Diana Franklin was unhappy when the girl arrived at the first meeting wearing a sun dress, high heels and makeup. The Franklins cut the second meeting short, saying they needed to leave to buy animal feed, Jackson said. The girl no longer wanted to see them after that, she said.

Also testifying Tuesday was Sawyer, the deputy, who reiterated what the social workers said, saying Diana Franklin saw nothing wrong with locking the girl up and withholding food: “She didn’t see any problem with it. It was a form of punishment.”

Under cross-examination by defense attorney Kevin Bradley, Sawyer admitted he saw no signs the girl was suffering from heat exhaustion, but said, “She didn’t look her best.”

While questioning Jackson, Bradley asked whether it was common for people to store pesticides and other chemicals in a shed outside. “But they don’t keep kids out there with it,” Jackson replied.

Bradley asked whether it was common for parents to confine a child to a room as punishment.

“A bedroom, not a garage,” Jackson answered.

Bradley in his opening statement Tuesday said Diana and Samuel Franklin were rearing the girl according to their deeply held religious faith, and had a difficult time with the child, who had suffered neglect from her birth parents.

The girl would have violent outbursts, break dishes, steal, lie, hoard food and gorge on it, Bailey said, so confining her to a room and restricting her access to food were reasonable measures.

He said the Franklins had raised three sons, today ages 24, 22 and 20, but Diana Franklin wanted a daughter, so they adopted the girl.

Prosecutor Peter Hoffman in his opening statement said the Franklins adopted the girl at age 7. In the years to follow, she was confined not just in the shed, but in a closet, an outhouse and a chicken coop. She was tied up and lashed and forced to wear a collar commonly used to train dogs, with a remote control transmitter that triggers a shock to electrodes on the collar.

At one point Diana Franklin even put a pistol to the girl’s head, Hoffman said.

Denied food, the girl had to forage through compost to get enough to eat, he said.

“This case is about the theft of childhood,” Hoffman told jurors. “Her childhood was stolen from her.”

Authorities investigating the case also arrested Samuel Franklin, but he has been indicted separately and is not on trial this week.

Diana Franklin faces 19 counts of child cruelty, eight counts of false imprisonment and one of aggravated assault.

Her trial resumes this morning in the Taylor County courthouse in Butler.”

Social workers recall finding teen girl who was kept locked in shed

[Ledger-Inquirer 11/10/15 by Tim Chitwood]

“So many knew, but did not act.

That was the testimony Friday in Diana Franklin’s child-cruelty trial, where five witnesses said they either heard or saw how Franklin was mistreating her adopted daughter between 2009 and 2012, and regret they did nothing to intervene.

One was retired Taylor sheriff’s deputy Robert Turner, who recalled Franklin enlisting his aid when the girl ran away from home.

Turner said he soon found her walking down the road, got her into his car and took her back to Franklin’s … home outside Butler.

When prosecutor Wayne Jernigan Jr. asked about the girl’s demeanor, Turner replied: “Scared to death. I couldn’t understand why she was so upset and scared.”

When she got home, she was “drawed up in a knot,” Turner said. “She didn’t say much of anything to anyone.”

When another deputy there told her that if she didn’t behave, she would wind up in a youth detention center or YDC, she replied, “I’d rather be in YDC,” Turner said.

“We tried to explain to her that it wasn’t a place to go,” he said. They told her she could wind up being a “mistress to someone,” he testified, adding the other deputy was more explicit: “He was more blunt about it and a little bit more descriptive.”

Turner later learned why the child wanted to escape, recalling a conversation in which Franklin talked of locking the girl up and feeding her only bread and water.

“I told her, I said, ‘You can’t do that to a child. You don’t do that to an animal.”

Franklin’s reply was, “It’s my daughter. I’ll do as I see fit,” he testified.

He now realizes he should have acted on that information, he said: “I regret I didn’t start an investigation and talk to the sheriff about it.”

Franklin’s defense attorney Kevin Bailey questioned Turner’s referring to Franklin as a “religious freak” during a Georgia Bureau of Investigation interview.

Turner said he found Franklin’s beliefs extreme as compared to his Baptist upbringing: “The ones who push it to the limit are the ones I consider freaks.”

Witness Sherry O’Neil said she was shocked to learn during a visit that Franklin had been locking the girl in various outbuildings on the family’s 73 acres.

Franklin took her on a tour of the property, pointing out an outhouse and a henhouse in which the girl had been confined for misbehavior. “I think I was in shock much of that day,” O’Neil recalled.

Franklin also pointed out a padlocked, cinderblock shed she told O’Neil was the girl’s bedroom. O’Neil could see the teen wasn’t safe there, she said: “There was no way or her to get out if there was a fire or something.”

She said she told Franklin what she thought of her disciplinary methods: “I said I felt like the tactics were military tactics and would not work on a girl.”

At one point Franklin told her that when the girl was adopted at age 9 in 2007, she had never heard the word “no” before, so at first that’s how her adoptive parents answered every request she made, O’Neil said.

She recalled also that Franklin told her she once handed the girl a loaded handgun and in effect said, “If you want to kill me, kill me.”

O’Neil said she should have alerted the authorities: “My regret was that I didn’t take action myself.”

When Franklin’s attorney asked why she didn’t act, she replied, “It was confusing about what do to.”

Witness Shirley Hartley said some local women familiar with the girl’s mistreatment discussed calling the Georgia Department of Family and Children Services or DFCS, which handled the girl’s adoption. Hartley feared the child could wind up in a worse predicament.

“I talked people out of calling DFCS. That is my biggest regret,” Hartley said.

Hartley said Franklin also told her of handing the girl a gun and saying, “If you hate me this much, go ahead and shoot me.”

Carol Johnstone, who lived across the road from Franklin, recalled seeing the child forced to work in a garden all day for weeks in brutal summer heat: “I never saw her take a drink of water the entire time,” she said. “It was terribly hot.”

A fourth witness, Richard Wainwright, told of going to the Franklins to help neighbor Steve Montgomery dig a ditch for a pipe there.  A chain on a trenching machine they used needed to be tightened, and Franklin volunteered to get them a wrench, he said.

She took him to the cinderblock shed, unlocked the padlock and called out that she was bringing someone in, he said.

“I thought she was talking to a dog,” Wainwright testified. “I was cautious because I didn’t want to get dog bit.”

When he went in, he was surprised to see a girl inside: “She looked like she might have been hungry and scared.”

He added: “I knew it wasn’t right…. I knew what I seen was wrong.”

He also regrets he did not report it, he said: “I really didn’t want to get involved.”

What he really wanted to do was get away, he said.

Taking the witness stand after Wainwright, Montgomery remembered what Wainwright said when he returned with the wrench:

“He said, ‘We’ve got to hurry up and get the hell out of here,’” recalled Montgomery, who said he also regrets “not saying something” about the way the girl was treated. “I’m not sure why I didn’t,” he added.

According to earlier testimony, the girl was removed from Franklin’s custody on May 25, 2012, when DFCS workers got a tip that she was being held in the cinderblock shed.

Now 18, the teen testified Franklin sometimes would lock her up without clothing, food or water; use collars made for dog training to give her painful electric shocks; and make her lie naked on her stomach as she was beaten with either the strap or buckle of a belt.

The high school senior also said she once threatened to commit suicide, provoking Franklin to put a loaded pistol to the teen’s head and say, “I’ll do it for you.”

Franklin faces 19 counts of child cruelty, eight counts of false imprisonment and one of aggravated assault.

Authorities also arrested husband Samuel Franklin, but he has been indicted separately and is not on trial.

Diana Franklin’s trial resumes Tuesday in the Taylor County courthouse.”

Witnesses in child-cruelty trial regret not reporting girl’s mistreatment [Ledger-Inquirer 11/13/15 by Tim Chitwood]

Update 3:”The trial for a Taylor County woman accused of mistreating her daughter continued Wednesday.

The allegations include charges that a couple kept a 15-year-old girl locked in a chicken coop.

The jury heard more testimony from the GBI investigator who handled the case of Dianna and Samuel Franklin. During her testimony, she read diary entries found during the search of the Franklin home that detailed the alleged abuse.

The investigator read countless entries detailing Dianna’s daily struggles being a parent for the teenage girl.

“I can’t take it anymore…I am truly spent and can’t take it anymore,” one passage from Dianna Franklin’s diary read.
Dianna described locking the girl in the chicken coop, starving her of food, and giving her lashes.

She even described times where the girl “stole” food from their home and ate it.

Dianna also described when DFACS took her adopted daughter.
She wrote:

“Father, please show mercy on Sam and I by not sending us to jail. Father in the name of Jesus, we are begging for your mercy because we are guilty, guilty of putting (adopted daughter’s name) in harm’s way. Guilty of doing awful, mean things to her, our motives or intentions shouldn’t matter because what we have done was wrong, very wrong, and we see clearly now. If we had heard of someone doing what we have done to their daughter, I’m sure we would be quick to judge,” another entry from Diana’s diary read allowed for the courtroom.

The prosecution called their final witness, a woman that the girl lived with in foster care after being rescued. The foster mom said she never had any problems with the girl.

The prosecution rested their case.

The defense called three witnesses including a private investigator, a classmate of the victim, and a fellow church member of the Franklins.

The Franklins were arrested after someone reported the alleged abuse to the state Department of Family and Children Services.”

Taylor County child abuse trial continues [13 WMAZ  11/18/15 by Justin R McDuffie]

“A lying and rebellious teen was how one local woman described her adopted daughter on Thursday, as a child abuse trial continued about an hour east of Columbus in Butler, GA.

A much different story coming from defendant Diana Franklin as she testified  at the Taylor County courthouse that she did not abuse her adopted daughter.

Diana Franklin took the stand for more than six hours in her own defense, crying and choked up at times saying she did not lock her adopted daughter in a chicken coop, starve her, or use a shock collar on her.

Franklin explained journal entries that an investigator read to the jury on Wednesday, which seemingly admitted fault and abuse.

The defendant said media coverage and community criticism during initial accusations in 2012 made her doubt herself, thus prompting the entry.

Franklin repeatedly expressed wanting her adopted daughter to be eager to be a part of her family, as well as repeatedly citing alleged behavioral problems with the teen.

The trial is scheduled to continue on Friday with cross examination from prosecutors.”

Mother testifying in child abuse case denies abusing adopted daughter [WTVM 11/19/15 by Emilie Arroyo]

Update 4:“The quest for justice inches one step closer for a Taylor County teen who endured five years of abuse at the hands of her adopted mother.

A Taylor County child abuse trial wrapped up for one woman, but prosecutors say they still have work to do.

A now 18-year-old girl described the term her adopted mother used when punishing her, a “sentence,” starting when she was only 10 years old, and continuing for five years.

Now the only “sentence” left for Diana Franklin to serve is her own.

A jury found the punishments by the mom to be cruel and illegal, which included locking the girl naked in a chicken coop in frigid temperatures along with using a shock collar on the child, starving her to the point the young girl tried dog food to fight hunger, locking the child in various outdoor spaces during hot summer months while withholding water, and more.

Diana Franklin was convicted Monday of 28 counts of child cruelty, aggravated assault, and false imprisonment.

“That’s what we try to do in every case, make communities safer, and that’s what our effort has been this time and we are glad it paid off,” said District Attorney Julia Slater.

However, prosecutors say there is another perpetrator in the mix, Franklin’s husband Samuel who is accused of sexually assaulting the girl, which is one of the reasons they believe Diana Franklin treated her adopted daughter the way she did.

“The real reason why this defendant got rid of- is because of Sam’s infidelity with – not my words, her words,” said prosecutor Wayne Jernigan during Monday’s closing arguments.

Samuel Franklin’s trial was scheduled for December, but community outrage and media attention has posed potential problems for finding an impartial jury, according to prosecutors and defense motions.

“They have filed with the Clerk of Superior court a mended motion for change of venue,” said Jernigan.”

Child abuse trial for adoptive father could be postponed [WTVM 11/25/15 by Emilie Arroyo]