Weeks after his release from prison, Franklin hired back to Prince George’s council job

He’s led a career marked by overcoming past mistakes, and now he hopes to play a role in a “comeback story” for an old colleague: former At-Large Councilmember Mel Franklin, whom he hired as his new chief of staff earlier this summer.

Franklin’s hiring comes weeks after he was released early from a one-year sentence for a criminal scheme to steal campaign funds to cover personal expenses — and the efforts taken to hide his actions. He resigned from the council last year before later pleading guilty to charges of felony theft and perjury, and was sentenced in November to five years in prison with all but one suspended and three years probation.

Hawkins (D-At Large) did not respond to multiple requests for an interview, but said in a statement Tuesday that he chose to hire Franklin after speaking with him recently and finding that “his contrition was sincere and evident.”

“His call to serve still shone brightly,” Hawkins’ statement said. “In that moment, I was moved to offer him the role as my Chief of Staff.”

A county council spokesperson said Franklin assumed the position on July 14 at a salary of $72,000.

Franklin also did not respond to an interview request. But in a July 22 post to his Facebook account, he announced that he had accepted the position as Hawkins’ chief of staff.

“I look forward to this new opportunity to serve,” he wrote. “Thank you [Councilmember] Hawkins! #SoGrateful #SoBlessed.”

In a post a month earlier, on June 18, Franklin wrote that he was grateful to be released in time to attend his son’s graduation ceremony.

Hawkins said in his statement that Franklin “hit the ground running.”

“Mel is back with a new passion, a new vision, and a new commitment to serving our incredible county,” Hawkins said. “I am proud to play a part in hiscomeback story.”

Not everyone in the county agrees with Hawkins’ show of faith.

“The humane side of me said, I know he needs a job,” said LaVonn Reedy Thomas, a member of the organization Citizens for Accountability in Governance. “But the taxpayer side of me, the political side of me, the professional side of me said, absolutely no way. Are you kidding me? I felt like it was an insult.”

Thomas, who has lived in the county for 46 years, said that what Franklin did “wasn’t a mistake.”

“What Mel did was a choice,” said Thomas, who worked eight years for former County Executive Rushern Baker. “He was not new to politics.”

“It’s cronyism,” she said. “For me, what this does is it opens up another conversation about corruption in Prince George’s County.”

The charges against Franklin stemmed from an almost decade-long scheme to use campaign funds to pay for personal, and often luxurious, expenses, prosecutors said.

Franklin had held one of the county’s two at-council seats for six years, and had been the 9th District council member for eight years before that, when he resigned suddenly on June 14, 2024. Six days later, the Maryland State Prosecutor announced charges against Franklin of embezzlement, felony theft scheme and perjury for siphoning off funds from the bank account of his campaign committee, “Friends of Mel Franklin,” to pay for expenses not related to his position on the council.

Violating Public Trust

From 2014 through 2023, the prosecutor’s office said in a November statement, Franklin stole more than $130,000 from the campaign committee to pay off personal debt and cover expenses including international trips, personal hotel stays, dinners, and cosmetic procedures for himself and a close friend.

In addition to his one-year prison sentence, he was also ordered by Anne Arundel County Circuit Judge Mark W. Crooks to pay back $133,168.67 for the funds he took

“Elected officials should be held accountable if they violate the public trust and exploit the Maryland electoral process for personal financial gain,” Maryland State Prosecutor Charlton T. Howard III said in a statement after Franklin pleaded guilty last August.

In a letter to Crooks on Nov. 3, Franklin apologized for the embarrassment he caused his family, for betraying the trust of those who donated to his campaign and for violating the trust of the county residents who elected him to the council.

“I will work every day to rebuild the trust that I destroyed for so many people who believed in me,” he wrote.

The case was not the first legal trouble for Franklin, who pleaded guilty in 2017 to driving under the influence in a crash that injured two people — and damaged the government-owned car he was driving. He damaged a different government-owned vehicle in two separate crashes in 2012.

Hawkins, a self-described “citizen’s advocate with a heart for the underdog,” wrote in his statement that he believes in redemption after being offered a second chance himself years ago following his own “transgression with the law.”

In 1983, he was arrested and later sentenced to five years in prison for armed robbery. Years later, while he was working for the county government, he was accused of sexually harassing a colleague in 2008. The allegations led to the county paying about $150,000 in damages and fees to Tonya Hairston, the colleague, according to a 2018 report from The Washington Post.

Having served alongside Franklin as one of the county’s two at-large councilmembers from 2018-2024, Hawkins said that he has been a trusted friend for the last 25 years.

“I know his heart and his character. Mel is deeply remorseful and knows he made a terrible mistake,” Hawkins said. “He owned up to it, apologized and has paid his dues. Now it’s time for his second act.”

– Maryland Matters reporter William J. Ford contributed to this story.

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