Hopefully, the wheels of justice will get back on track and roll on down the line... 

 

https://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20151026/west-loop/after-8-years-reginald-potts-stand-trial-for-nailah-franklin-murder

After 8 Years, Reginald Potts to Stand Trial for Nailah Franklin Murder







By Erica Demarest | October 26, 2015 6:25am
@ericademarest



COOK COUNTY CRIMINAL COURTHOUSE — It's been more than eight years since Nailah Franklin was found dead in southeast suburban Calumet City, her body naked and starting to decompose.

The West Loop pharmaceutical rep had been reported missing on Sept. 17, 2007, CBS Chicago reported. Though friends and family launched a high-profile search — complete with rallies, fliers and televised pleas — Franklin wasn't found dumped in the woods until nine days later.

Reginald Potts, a man she briefly dated, was charged with murder in December 2007 and held without bail.

Now, after years of delays, Potts is finally expected to stand trial this week.

Since Potts was first charged, the 38-year-old has hired and fired several attorneys — and even tried to represent himself on more than one occasion. According to a Tribune investigation, Potts has racked up more than 200 infractions inside the Cook County Jail as he awaits trial.


Court records show Potts also has been hit with additional felony charges of damaging government property, obstructing justice and attacking multiple peace officers.

While most murder cases go to trial within two years, state officials told the Tribune, the combined disciplinary issues and changes in his legal representation have created repeated delays in Potts' case.

When Potts petitioned to represent himself in 2008, he told Cook County Judge Thomas Gainer Jr. he hoped for a speedy trial.

"I'm not guilty of this," Potts reportedly said during the October 2008 interaction. "I don't want to sit in jail for two more years."

"I think you are making a horrible, horrible mistake that could end up costing you your life," Gainer told Potts, according to the Tribune, which covered the hearing. "Do you understand that?"

Potts reportedly told the judge he had no legal experience, but could access the Cook County Jail law library once a week.

Though Potts was granted permission to represent himself, he later changed his mind. He has been represented by a public defender since October 2014, court records show.

Jury selection for Potts' trial is expected to begin Monday.

For Franklin's relatives, the trial can't come quickly enough.

“It’s been very hard, day to day," sister Ashley Chappell Rice told CBS Chicago last year. "It’s like she was snatched right from out of our lives."

Franklin's father died three years ago, without ever having seen justice.

"I really think he died of a broken heart," sister Lehia Franklin Acox said in a Tribune interview last year. "Nailah was the apple of his eye. He couldn't wrap his head around why she even knew somebody who could do something like this." 

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http://chicago.suntimes.com/news/7/71/1056037/nailah-franklin-boyfriend-email-asking-alive

Nailah Franklin's boyfriend says he sent her an email asking: 'Are you alive?'

 Written By Rummana Hussain Posted: 10/29/2015, 01:59pm

When Andre Wright didn’t hear from his new girlfriend for several hours on a fall day eight years ago, he called her and left a voicemail.

He didn’t get a call back on Sept 18, 2007. Instead he got a “cryptic” text from Nailah Franklin’s number: “At a dinner. Call you back.”

Wright testified Thursday that the next day while at work in Milwaukee, he sent Franklin an email asking her, “Are you alive?”


She wasn’t, according to Cook County prosecutors.

They said Franklin, a 28-year-old pharmaceutical rep, was killed by her ex-boyfriend, Reginald Potts, who was enraged that she told their mutual friends about his criminal past. 

http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20151110/university-village/reginald-potts-murder-trial-closing-arguments-begin

Reginald Potts Murder Trial: Closing Arguments Begin







By Erica Demarest | November 10, 2015 10:55am
@ericademarest

COOK COUNTY CRIMINAL COURTHOUSE — Attorneys have started presenting closing arguments Tuesday in the Reginald Potts murder trial.

Potts, 40, was charged with first-degree murder nearly eight years ago after Nailah Franklin, a bubbly University Village pharmaceutical rep, was discovered dead.
 

Potts' defense team has argued that there's very little evidence linking Potts to Franklin's murder. There are no eyewitnesses or fingerprints, and Potts has maintained his innocence.

"The police investigation in this case has been tunnel vision with one target: Reginald Potts," Assistant Public Defender Michael Morrissey said last month. "The case is riddled with doubt."

Since Potts was first charged in December 2007, there've been myriad delays in his case. Potts has hired and fired new counsel several times, and even tried to represent himself on more than one occasion.

In the nearly eight years he's been awaiting trial inside Cook County Jail, where he's being held without bail, Potts has racked up more than 200 infractions and several new felony charges, including battery to police and criminal damage to government property.

On Monday, Potts declined to testify on his behalf.

He keeps trying to drag it out.

http://abc7chicago.com/news/sentencing-hearing-for-reginald-potts-begins-/1223662/

Sentencing hearing for Reginald Potts, found guilty of murdering Nailah Franklin, begins Monday




By Leah Hope 

Monday, February 29, 2016 08:33AM


CHICAGO (WLS) --
 The sentencing hearing for Reginald Potts, convicted of murdering Nailah Franklin in 2007, began Monday and was delayed briefly after his protests about cameras in the courtroom.

The judge had ruled that cameras could be present in the Cook County courtroom for the proceedings. However, as the hearing was scheduled to begin, Potts, 38, objected to the cameras stating, "I don't want to be a part of this" calling it a "continuing sensationalization and publicity of this case."





In November, a jury found Potts guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Franklin, a young pharmaceutical representative who he briefly dated.

Franklin, 28, had broken off the relationship and was seen alive at her University Village condo on September 18, 2007. Following an extensive 10-day search, Franklin's badly decomposed body was found in a wooded area in Calumet City behind a vacant video store owned by Potts' brother-in-law.

Potts, who was a successful businessman at the time, was arrested shortly afterward.

Franklin had warned friends that she was afraid of Potts before her disappearance. 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-reginald-potts-sentencing-met-0309-20160308-story.html

Ripped as 'conniving coward,' Reginald Potts Jr. given life in prison


Steve Schmadeke•Contact Reporter
Chicago Tribune

March 9, 2016, 5:21 AM



After using legal maneuvers to drag out the criminal charges he faced for more than eight years, Reginald Potts Jr. finally met his day of reckoning Tuesday when a Cook County judge ripped him as "a cold, calculating, conniving coward of a con man" and sentenced him to life in prison for the slaying of a former lover.

The family of the victim, Nailah Franklin, greeted the maximum possible sentence — which carries no possibility of parole — with a smattering of applause.

During remarks that took about an hour, Judge Thomas Gainer Jr. tore into Potts, 38, who last week had maintained his innocence, blaming his first-degree murder conviction on the news media and seeming to fixate on showing Franklin hadn't broken up with him. The judge had held an unusually lengthy five-day sentencing hearing last week.

"You didn't erase her, Mr. Potts," Gainer said in a reference to a threat Potts had made to Franklin before her disappearance. "She lives on in the hearts and minds of all those people who cherished her while she was alive."