On a December morning in 2015, a 27-year-old man named Franklin C. Callens was leaving his home in Austell, Georgia, for work, a routine that tragically ended in his untimely death. His life was cut short in the parking lot of the Concepts 21 apartment complex where he lived, the victim of a violent crime spree that had been tearing through the metro Atlanta area.
The perpetrators, two teenagers named Christopher Iverson Green, 15, and Cameron Miguel Mathis, 16, were in the midst of a multi-county crime wave that began in the early hours of December 13, 2015. Their spree started with a carjacking in DeKalb County, which they subsequently crashed in a fiery wreck on Interstate 20. Undeterred, they proceeded to carjack another vehicle at gunpoint and then robbed a man of his cell phone in Douglasville.
It was with this stolen vehicle that they arrived at the Austell apartment complex. There, they encountered Franklin Callens and shot him in the chest with a. 357 revolver before stealing his 2013 Toyota Corolla. Callens succumbed to his injuries, and his car was later found abandoned in Clayton County. The key to breaking the case proved to be the cell phone stolen from the Douglasville victim, which investigators were able to track to Green's home. A search of the residence uncovered property belonging to other victims of the crime spree.
Within hours of the murder, both Christopher Iverson Green and Cameron Miguel Mathis were arrested. In January 2019, they pleaded guilty to their roles in the devastating chain of events. Green entered a guilty plea to charges of malice murder, armed robbery, hijacking a motor vehicle, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. He was sentenced to life in prison. Mathis pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter, armed robbery, hijacking a motor vehicle, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, receiving a sentence of 25 years in prison.
