Public January 6 profile · ready to claim

Roy Nelson Franklin

Pardoned January 6 defendant

Archive card · not a photograph

Roy Nelson Franklin was a Springfield, Illinois man. He was 67 years old. He died on October 15, 2023, of lung cancer, in hospice care, before his case ever reached a judgment. Remember that. Roy Nelson Franklin died presumed innocent, and he stayed that way, because a charge is not a conviction and he never got the chance to answer one in front of a jury. Here is what the record shows. FACT: Franklin was charged in December 2021, nearly a year after January 6. CHARGE ONLY: The government alleged he reached the floor of the United States Senate. That allegation was never proven at trial and never admitted in a plea. FACT: A plea hearing was set for December 15, 2023. FACT: Roy Nelson Franklin died October 15, 2023, two months before that date. FACT: He had entered hospice care and was described as extremely ill when the court was notified. THEIR ACCOUNT: Franklin told the Chicago Sun-Times he got arrested for supporting Trump. THEIR ACCOUNT: He told an FBI agent, "I admit I was there, and I am proud of the fact that I was there and stood up for a cause that I believed in." He said it plain. He never took it back. Then he got sick, and then he was gone. WHAT THIS DOES NOT PROVE: there is no verdict against Roy Nelson Franklin. There is no plea. There is no sentence. Nothing in this record establishes that he committed any crime. WHAT IT DOES PROVE: a 67 year old man from Springfield spent the last two years of his life under a federal indictment, got cancer, went into hospice, and died with the government's case still unproven. That is not a footnote. That is a man. Springfield ought to remember his name. FACT: On January 20, 2025, the presidential proclamation granted pardons for offenses relating to the events at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021. Roy Nelson Franklin did not live to see it. CASE RECORD Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia Charged: December 2021 Died: October 15, 2023 Disposition: Case ended by death. No conviction. This profile is unclaimed. If this is you, or your family, claiming it is free, forever.