Postmaster emerges from legal 'meltdown'

Acquitted of fraud, the 47-year-old still faces an administrative appeal of his firing.

By JACKIE RIPLEY

© St. Petersburg Times, published February 27, 2000

ODESSA -- In 27 years with the U.S. Postal Service, Terry Franklin said, he had established a sterling work record and never even called in sick. In 1991, he was promoted to postmaster and in 1993 was transferred to the Odessa post office, on Tarpon Springs Road.

But 23 months ago, after rumors of wrongdoing, the 47-year-old Citrus Park resident was escorted from his workplace by postal inspectors and placed on administrative leave. Inspectors began investigating financial irregularities and in March notified Franklin he was being fired from his $60,000-a-year job. Before he could get very far in his administrative appeal, a federal grand jury indicted him in August on nine counts of fraud and embezzlement, and Franklin began a fearful, expensive struggle to clear his name and stay out of prison.

Last week, after a seven-day trial in Tampa's federal court, Franklin won vindication. On Thursday, a jury acquitted him of eight counts of fraudulent record keeping and one count of failing to account for public money.

"It was like a meltdown," said Franklin, who faced the possibility of three years in prison if convicted. "The trial was the hardest thing I've ever had to endure. I can't describe the stress I was under through the whole thing."

Stress also showed on the faces of Franklin's family as his wife, Vicki, and their children, Marina, 25, and Kyle, 13, watched last week's trial from the front row in U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew's courtroom.

"Our family pulled together, and now we're going to stay together," Vicki Franklin said after Thursday's verdict.

The not-guilty verdicts don't mean Franklin's automatic return to work, however. He still faces an administrative appeal of his removal before the Merit Systems Protection Board. Dave McBride of the National Association of Postmasters of the United States said Tampa postal officials could decide to drop the removal action and allow Franklin to return to work.

"We're disappointed the Postal Inspection Service would prosecute fraud over something that should have remained an administrative matter and not criminal," McBride said. "Mr. Franklin has 27 years of exemplary service without a blemish on his record."

Postal officials in Tampa could not be reached for comment Friday.

Federal prosecutors accused Franklin of intending to deceive the Postal Service by generating false financial records and by failing to render an accounting of money he was responsible for collecting at the Odessa post office. Testifying in his own defense last week, Franklin told jurors the problem arose from an accounting error he was attempting to correct. He said cash was being set aside in the post office safe to bring the ledgers back into balance. Once the error was found, the money was to have been applied there, he said.

U.S. postal inspectors, however, did not believe Franklin's explanation, especially after they discovered a $5,000 discrepancy in post office ledgers but only $3,200 in the safe to cover the shortfall.

In effect, they accused Franklin of stashing money in "his own piggy bank," which clearly was not the case, said Franklin's attorney, Marcelino Huerta.

In his closing argument, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay L. Hoffer countered Franklin's claim by saying that if there was an accounting error, Franklin "should have called a supervisor and said he had a problem. He could have picked up a telephone and asked for assistance."

The jury, though, apparently believed Franklin's explanation, acquitting him after one hour and 15 minutes of deliberation Thursday morning.

"He was doing this in good faith. Other people had access to the funds," Huerta said. Franklin "has good character. This is about suspicion."

- Jackie Ripley can be reached at (813) 226-3468 or ripley@sptimes.com.

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