| “ | With everybody gone, we could have finally been together, but you had to call the police! | ” |
— Justin
| ||
Justin Franco was an "injustice collector"-type serial killer and one-time mass murderer who appeared in the Season Thirteen episode "Annihilator".
Background
Not much of Justin's life is not known other than he started working as a marketing coordinator in 2012. At some point in his life, he met Corrine Jordan, a woman who worked as a flight attendant and lived with six other people. While he appeared as kind and helpful to her roommates, he was secretly an internet troll, posting negative comments on various message boards. He wanted to live in the same house as Corrine to be close to her, but one of her roommates, Ray Murphy, did not allow this. When he saw how Ray acted as a leader and was respected by the others, he decided to emulate him, going so far as to buy the same clothes as him. He believed this would allow him to be seen by Corrine as desirable. His obsession with Corrine led him to believe that the other roommates were obstacles to a relationship with her. When Corrine went to Zurich due to her job, he decided to kill her roommates and stage their deaths as a robbery.
Annihilator
One night, Ray and his three roommates: Charles Cook, Jenny Kyle, and Vicky Wilson are hanging out in their rental house, eating pizza and fooling around in the living room. Ray goes to the kitchen to grab hot sauce. When he returns, he finds Justin holding his friends hostage with a knife that Ray kept in his bedroom. Appearing to recognize him, Ray says he doesn't have to do this. However, Ray and his roommates are later tied up and brutally stabbed to death by Justin. He later broke a window to stage a break-in. One of the other roommates, Larry Scanlon, is suspected, as he was the only surviving roommate who had not been found plus he had a history of troubled behavior. Since being kicked out of the house, Larry has been staying with a co-worker. Larry is seen walking towards his car in a hurry. As soon as he is settled in his car, Justin jumps up behind him and covers his head with a plastic bag. Larry struggles against his attacker, but is ultimately murdered. Justin later adds a fake suicide letter to his windshield, but no drugs are discovered in his system, leading the BAU to realize Larry was framed and murdered.
The BAU, realizing that the roommates were as close as a family and the unsub, desperate to be included, was not, investigate one of the remaining roommates, Rachel Willow,to find out who it might be. She suggests Justin, who was always nice to them and a sweetheart on the outside, but Garcia exposes him as a troll online. Rossi and Simmons storm into Justin's apartment, but he isn't present. Rossi discovers his wardrobe to be exactly like Ray's. Rossi realizes that the murder was planned - despite not knowing that Rachel would be staying with her sister, he knew Corinne was on a trip and Larry had been kicked out . Simmons suggests that Corinne loved Ray, which is why Justin was trying so hard to be like Ray. Justin is later seen at the airport, waiting for Corinne by her car, but the BAU is one step ahead - they find Corinne and send her to safety as Alvez and Lewis, posing as civilians, confront him with guns up. Justin, distressed, produces a gun and holds it up to his chin, threatening to kill himself unless Corinne is brought to him. Barnes, desperate to have him alive, decides to go rogue and bring out Corinne, going against the team's plan. Justin confronts her saying they could have been together. He shoots her as Alvez shoots him dead. Corinne, however, is revealed to be wearing a bullet-proof vest and survives.
Modus Operandi
Justin targeted the people that lived with Corrine at the group home. He killed his first four victims by stabbing them each of them with a knife belonging to his first victim Ray Murphy, holding each of them either at gunpoint or knifepoint[1] and having Ray bound their arms and legs together with duct tape before binding Ray's arms and legs together himself. After the murders, he made it appear as if the home had been robbed. When he killed Larry Scanlon (who had been kicked out of the house prior to Justin's murders), he somehow managed to break into his car, hid in the backseats, suffocated Larry with a plastic bag and framed him for the murders by making it appears as if Larry had committed suicide by drug overdose and taped a suicide note to the front wheel.
Profile
Justin is a narcissist who thinks he should be in charge, and rejection of such authority enrages him. As an "Injustice Collector", he remembers every perceived slight. He wanted to belong to a group, but wasn't allowed. He came across as harmless, offering to help even without being asked. He had never openly ask to move in a house while being comfortable in it.
Real-Life Comparison
Justin appears to be primarily inspired by Elliot Rodger - Both are spree killers who had histories of harassing people, were set off by rejections from other women, hating other men for having better social standing than them, killed people in their places of residence by stabbing, and attempted to kill themselves (though Rodger was successful, while Justin only threatened to do so, then tried and failed to kill the woman he was targeting).
Known Victims
- March 7, 2018:
- The massacre at the group home:
- Ray Murphy (forced to bind the others with duct tape, then bound himself and stabbed to death along with the next three victims; left the knife in his chest)
- Charles Cook
- Jenny Kyle
- Vicky Wilson
- Rachel Willow (intended to kill, but abandoned the plan when she wasn’t home)
- The massacre at the group home:
- March 8, 2018
- Larry Scanlon (suffocated with a plastic bag; staged to look like an overdose)
- Corrine Jordan (attempted; shot but protected by a bulletproof vest)
Notes
- The BAU initially profiled Justin like a family annihilator because the residents of the house behaved like a family, and Justin was motivated by envy and rage.
Appearances
References
- ↑ Since he appeared at the beginning of the episode off-screen, it is not known if he used a gun or knife to hold his victims captive