Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

Acting U.S. Attorney Richard G. Frohling of the Eastern District of Wisconsin announced that on May 20, 2021, Chief United States District Judge Pamela Pepper sentenced Donquell Franklin (age 30), of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to 84 months in federal prison for an armed robbery of an undercover ATF Task Force Officer.  Judge Pepper ordered that his sentence run consecutive to his state revocation sentence.

On March 2, 2021, Franklin entered a guilty plea to robbery of personal property of the United States, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2112, and using and carrying a firearm in furtherance of the robbery, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 924(c). 

According to the plea agreement, in 2017, ATF agents and task force officers were conducting an undercover investigation of illegal firearm sales.  On April 4, 2017, Franklin went into the vehicle of an undercover ATF task force officer and pointed a semi-automatic pistol at the officer.  When the officer pushed the gun away, Franklin ejected the magazine, re-inserted it, racked the slide, and pointed it at the officer again.  Franklin robbed the officer of ATF buy money, an ATF issued iPhone, and the keys to the vehicle.  Law enforcement officers quickly arrived at the scene, pursued Franklin by foot, and found him hiding in a garage in an alley on West McKinley Avenue in Milwaukee.  Officers recovered from Franklin’s flight path the firearm, the iPhone, and the keys to the undercover officer’s vehicle. 

The Milwaukee Field Office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Milwaukee Police Department, and the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office investigated the case.  The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Benjamin A. Wesson. 

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