Dec
11
Reginald Potts Threatened To ‘Erase’ Nailah Franklin, Say Prosecutors
Filed Under Nailah Franklin, Reginald Potts | 3 Comments
Prosecutors say Reginald Potts threated to “erase” Nailah Franklin.
Calling Nailah Franklin’s killing “premeditated,” an assistant state’s attorney says that Reginald Potts stalked and threatened to “erase” Nailah Franklin before she was killed, reports the Chicago Sun-Times.
A first assistant state’s attorney says Reginald Potts was caught on video stalking Nailah Franklin and explains how Reginald Potts’ and Nailah Franklin’s cell phone records tore apart Reginald Potts’ alibi.
Witnesses at Nailah Franklin’s building also saw Reginald Potts stalking Nailah, according to law enforcement officials.
“It was premeditated,” First Assistant State’s Attorney Robert Milan said after the hearing. “This defendant went through a lot of trouble and time in order to take Ms. Franklin out to an abandoned area — a desolate area — and take her life.” …
In early September, Franklin sent an e-mail to friends discussing Potts’ criminal past, Milan said. When Potts found out, he made threatening calls to her. “He told her he could have her erased,” Milan said.
Cell phone records –television news reports say GPS signals — indicate that Reginald Potts and Nailah Franklin were on 159th Street in Calumet City where Nailah Franklin was was later found dead by police, reports the Chicago Sun-Times.
The cell records depict Potts and Franklin traveling east in Calumet City at the same time that night, and show them both in the area where Franklin’s body was later found, Milan said.
After dumping Franklin’s body, Potts kept her cell phone and drove her car to Hammond, Ind., where he left it, Milan said.
Prosecutors say after Nailah Franklin was killed, Reginald Potts kept her cell phone and made three hang-up calls to 911 operators using Nailah Franklin’s phone.
CBS 2 News Chicago reports how Reginald Potts’ story fell apart when law enforcement investigated cell phone GPS records.
Prosecutors say global positioning system records from a cell phone helped solve the murder of Nailah Franklin. A judge Monday denied bail for her ex-acquaintance, Reginald Potts.
As CBS 2’s Dorothy Tucker reports, the man charged with killing Franklin can blame his arrest on his cell phone. Police say Potts is a suspect in Franklin’s death because on the day she disappeared Potts gave one story to police, but the satellite records on his cell phone told another.
News reports are detailing Reginald Potts’ violent past.
Reginald Potts’ ex-wife also alleges that he made threats against her, reports the Naperville Sun.
The threats Reginald Michael Potts Jr. made against Nailah Franklin in the days before her murder are not the first he’s made against women in his life. …
According to court records, Potts contacted his ex-wife via e-mail Oct. 10. That message was sent less than a month after the murder of Franklin, a 28-year-old pharmaceutical sales representative from Chicago whom Potts had been seeing on and off for the past year.
Dec
10
Reginald Potts Held Without Bail in Nailah Franklin Case
Filed Under Nailah Franklin, Reginald Potts | Leave a Comment
Cook County Judge Donald Panarese ordered Reginald Potts held without bail at a hearing today in the Nailah Franklin murder case, reports Kim Janssen of the Daily Southtown Star.
The 31-year-old man accused of killing pharmaceutical representative Nailah Franklin was ordered held with bail during a court hearing today.
Judge Donald Panarese refused Reginald Potts’ bail after First Assistant State’s Attorney Bob Milan laid out how phone records and the testimony of Potts’ friends contradicted his alibi.
Dec
10
Reginald Potts’ Record Examined; More On Cell Phone
Filed Under Nailah Franklin, Reginald Potts | 2 Comments
Nailah Franklin
The Chicago Sun-Times has more on Reginald Potts’ extensive history of contacts with police in Illinois. Reginald Potts was recently charged in the death of Nailah Franklin who was discovered dead in Calumet City after an extensive search in Illinois and Indiana after she had gone missing after failing to show up for a work meeting.
Reports Annie Sweeney in the Sun-Times:
Reginald Potts’ extensive court record reveals a history of angry clashes with women and police, and a penchant for stealing cars.
He also appears to have enjoyed the finer things, driving luxury cars like Bentleys and Mercedes, carrying as much as $2,500 in cash, and living in the city’s posher neighborhoods. In interviews, he mentions state officials he says he knows. …
“Absolutely I did not have anything to do with this,” (Reginald Potts) said of Franklin’s death, in an interview.
Princess Dominique has a post with more about Reginald Potts gathered from the internet.
Potts has an interesting criminal history involving prior assaults on girlfriends and an escape from FBI custody. To look at his photo he seems to be a man with a charming, reserved demeanor. But looks can be deceiving. The twist in all of this is that the man (or one of his many girlfriends) has leaked emails between Nailah and Potts onto the internet in a move to absolve him of guilt. But one of his responses to her emails paints him in a harsh light (maybe they shouldn’t have leaked that email?)
Apparently, Nailah was smitten with this playboy who was well-to-do with multiple businesses, multiple women, and lived a lavish lifestyle that included a posh condo and a fancy home in the suburbs. According to the emails she sent to Potts, Nailah was dating him but was not in a serious relationship with Potts. As often happens when young women give it up up to “ballers,” her emotions got involved which led her to make some questionable decisions - like not asking him to use protection.
The Chicago Tribune reports that Reginald Potts’ cell phone records show that he was in the Calumet City area, instead of the places where he says he was on the day Nailah Franklin was killed, thus destroying his alibi.
The day that Chicago police say Nailah Franklin was killed, the man charged in her death claimed he was shopping at a retail store and hanging out with friends at several Gold Coast hot spots, sources said.
But Wentworth Area detectives and the FBI instead tracked Reginald Potts Jr.’s cell phone that evening to the Calumet City area, where Franklin’s car and her body were found, sources said. Potts’ “deeply flawed” alibi helped lead to murder charges Friday against the 31-year-old man, who once dated Franklin, police said. …
Police sources said Potts had been a suspect since Franklin was reported missing. The two had a heated e-mail exchange the week before she disappeared. Shortly before that, he allegedly threatened her on the telephone, and she filed a police report against him Sept. 7, said Wentworth Area Cmdr. Steve Peterson.
In the months after Franklin’s body was found, Potts made bizarre public pleas on his MySpace page and to the media claiming his innocence. In an interview with the Tribune in November, he denied having anything to do with the slaying.
“What would be the motive for me to do anything to her?” Potts said in the interview. “It’s an unfortunate situation, but it doesn’t mean I should be run through the wringer. I had nothing to do with it.”
