Two suspects accused of a murderous crime spree across the South are hunted down and captured in a small Pennsylvania motel.
A man and woman team from North Carolina who have been on the run since late October and have been linked to a crime spree in the South that has left at least two people dead have been captured. It started with a warrant being issued for a hitchhiker and ended up at a Pennsylvania motel with one of the suspects dead on the floor and the other one surrendering to local police.
Police in Davidson County, N.C., made the identification of the suspects as Lloyd Franklin, 34, and Jennifer Lanning, 38. Both of them had been on the run from North Carolina since Oct. 29 when the two bodies of an elderly couple were found in their house with their van missing, reports The New York Post. The police in Pennsylvania have confirmed that Franklin was found dead in the motel room and that Lanning came out and surrendered to the police.
Before the elderly man was killed by Franklin, police believe that he shot Franklin. Franklin and Lanning looked to be headed up North and were leaving a trail of robberies in their wake. They robbed three pharmacies, two in North Carolina and one in South Carolina, in order to get some 1,800 painkillers. Then, it seemed, the couple made a mistake.
Along the way to Pennsylvania, they picked up a hitchhiker who happened to be wanted by the police for a parole violation. The police tracked down the hitchhiker and realized that he was actually in their area. The police tracked him to a motel room in Trevose, Penn. They knocked on the door and Franklin answered the door. Startled that it was the police, Franklin started shooting at them.
The police said they didn’t fire back because they noticed other people were in the room. Lanning immediately surrendered and Franklin ended up dead on the floor from a gunshot. No one seems to know how Franklin got shot. The other man in the room also surrendered to the police.
Police speculate that Franklin killed himself rather than be taken by police.