He has eight life sentences and one death sentence hanging over his head, but judgment day is not what concerns avowed racist Joseph Paul Franklin most as he awaits execution in Missouri.
The serial killer spends his days locked in a tiny, maximum-security cell, growing increasingly annoyed that he has not been charged - despite repeated confessions - with the 1980 slayings of two women in West Virginia.
''They haven't done anything yet. They are so slow,'' the 47-
year-old says in a voice laced with anger and frustration. ''Are they going to charge me or not?''
The prosecutor in Pocahontas County, W.Va., says he has no plans to pursue Mr. Franklin, who confessed earlier this week to killing two cousins as they walked in Bond Hill in 1980.
''I don't believe Franklin was the killer,'' says Walt Weiford, who in 1993 successfully prosecuted another man on two counts of first-degree murder for the crime. ''He has not given us anything to believe that he killed these two girls in West Virginia.''
Though Mr. Franklin claims to be most concerned about the man who was convicted, his comments Thursday make it appear he also is consumed by his image and how that would suffer if he remains uncharged in West Virginia.
''I've become kind of obsessed about it,'' he said during an hourlong interview with The Enquirer. ''I don't want it to ruin my reputation.''
He has been jailed since October 1980, when he was arrested by federal agents outside a Florida blood bank. The arrest capped a nationwide manhunt that involved the federal government and authorities from numerous states.
''That made me feel very important,'' Mr. Franklin says. ''I was kind of flattered, really.''
Authorities have attributed 18 slayings between 1977 and 1980 to Mr. Franklin, but in conversations with The Enquirer, the drifter from Alabama has hinted the count is higher.
He refused to talk about specific numbers, but has said the June 8, 1980, sniper slayings of Darrell Lane and Dante Evans Brown in Bond Hill were his ''12th and 13th murders,'' even though authorities place the two as Nos. 11 and 12.
''You never can tell,'' he says. ''There could be surprises.''
Mr. Weiford says the surprise will not be in his jurisdiction because he is convinced he prosecuted the right man four years ago.
He says Mr. Franklin has given police only sketchy details - all of which were public knowledge - about the deaths of the two women,
whose bullet-riddled bodies were found in a remote area almost 17 years ago.
More important, he notes, the man who admittedly despises black people, Jews and interracial couples failed two lie detector tests about the slayings last fall.
''I don't know what would motivate him to (confess),'' Mr. Weiford says. ''It may be that he wants a few more notches on his gun or something.''
Mr. Franklin, who was indicted Tuesday on two counts of aggravated murder for the deaths of Dante, 13, and Darrell, 14, vehemently denies that allegation, saying the state of West Virginia ''has got an innocent man.''
He says he killed the two white hitchhikers because both admitted to dating black men.
''If I ever got a chance to kill any race mixtures like that, I did it,'' he said.
Assistant Hamilton County Prosecutor Jennifer Day said her office is working to bring Mr. Franklin back to Cincinnati to stand trial, but the transfer could take awhile. Mr. Franklin faces life in prison if convicted; Ohio did not have a death penalty in 1980.
Mr. Franklin admits he first killed in August 1977, when he shot an interracial couple in Madison, Wis. He also takes credit for shooting and paralyzing Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt in March 1978, and for wounding civil-rights leader Vernon Jordan in a sniper attack in May 1980.
He is serving life sentences for the murders of the Wisconsin couple and for the August 1980 sniper slayings of two black joggers in Salt Lake City. He was sentenced to death in February for the 1977 murder of a Jewish man outside a Clayton, Mo., synagogue.
HIGH FASHION PROSECTOR GETS HER MAN Cliff Radel column
Previous stories
SNIPER FEARED OHIO ELECTRIC CHAIR April 16, 1997
FRANKLIN THOUGHT MESSAGE MISSED April 16, 1997
CASE CLOSED April 16, 1997
''REIGN OF TERROR'' April 16, 1997
RACIST KILLER CONFESSES TO SLAYING TWO BOYS HERE April 15, 1997
HATE KILLER SENTENCED TO DIE Feb. 28, 1997
