A male Kennesaw State University student broke into a house making claims of murder, punched his girlfriend, vandalized a family’s home and attempted to bribe officers with $17 billion.
By: Micah Woods
10:35 p.m.
Franklin Bearson broke into a house making claims of murder. Bearson, 21-years-old, stormed into the house near Kennesaw State at 10:35 p.m. He was a fraternity member with one of the tenants, and had visited the home on occasion.
He stormed in while only one of the tenants was home. The door was unlocked so Bearson stormed in mumbling and speaking non-sense. He did not address the only tenant home; rather he walked in pacing from one side of the living room to the other.
Brad Sanders, the tenant, said Bearson was not acting like himself. Brad was not one of his fraternity members, but knew him from the occasional visits Bearson had to the house.
"I asked him what his name was at that moment even though I knew who he was, but he was not acting like himself," Brad said.
As Bearson began to calm down, Brad asked him what was going on.
Brad said he was in a state of shock when Bearson said, "I killed my girlfriend and my best friend in a car accident." After Bearson came out with his claims of murder Brad told me, "I didn't know what to do. I began to call the police, but then his girlfriend and best friend which he claimed to murder walked in my front door."
10:45 p.m.
Rachel Winters and Troy Ponter, Bearson’s girlfriend and best friend, came into the house breathing heavy and grabbed Bearson to take him away.
“When his girlfriend and best friend walked in they apologized to me for the intrusion and took him away. I was confused, and I locked the door behind them because I was in shock. I looked out my window to see what was going on when I saw Bearson punch his girlfriend in the face,” Brad said.
Bearson ran off into the woods behind the house after he punched Rachel. His best friend called out to Bearson to come back, but did not see or hear from him for 10 minutes.
10:55 p.m.
Bearson revealed himself when screams from down the street rang out through the neighborhood. Bearson threw a brick into a family’s home down the street from where the incident originally occurred.
The police were called and Bearson resisted arrest. The police detained him, and put him into custody. Brad, Rachel and Troy all said that Bearson tried to bribe the officers by claiming to have $17 billion.
Rachel Winters
I sat down with Rachel after the incident occurred and she told me, “He had been acting weird for a couple of days prior to the incident. He started doing different things with the stock market and claimed he won $17 billion. He was not sleeping at all.”
Bearson was charged with trespassing, assault, vandalism and resisting arrest.
“I was in shock. He has never done anything like this before. After the police took my statement they kept telling me Franklin’s incident occurred due to methamphetamine use. I told the police that I spend a lot of time with him, and he would never do that, but they were firm in their accusations,” Rachel said.
Reality
After the incident was over they took Bearson to Kennestone Hospital. Bearson was diagnosed with bipolar disease and schizophrenia disorder.
All charges were dropped against Bearson. He had to check into a mental hospital for observation and further diagnosis. The cause of the mental breakdown has yet to be determined.
According to doctors, schizophrenia and bipolar disease begins to show symptoms in males between the ages of 16 and 35.
