Woman Tells Court Father Is a Killer

REDWOOD CITY — Eileen Franklin-Lipsker, who has accused her father of molesting and killing her playmate 21 years ago, testified Monday that she watched in terror as he smashed the little girl’s skull with a rock.

“Her hands flew up to her head. . . . The next thing I heard was two blows. It sounded terrible,” testified Franklin-Lipsker, whose best friend, Susan Nason, was slain Sept. 22, 1969.

George Franklin Sr., 51, was charged with murdering Susan after his daughter told police last November that she had become conscious of a repressed memory of the attack. Franklin, who faces a possible life sentence if convicted, has pleaded not guilty.

Franklin-Lipsker, 29, claims her father threatened to kill her if she told anyone about the crime. She testified that the memory flooded back last year as she looked at her own young daughter.

On the witness stand, Franklin-Lipsker also recalled that when she was 11, her father pinned her down on a table as his best friend raped her. Like the alleged murder, Franklin-Lipsker testified, the memory of the rape remained repressed until recently.

Franklin-Lipsker appeared tense and sometimes distraught as she was questioned by Assistant Dist. Atty. Elaine Tipton.

She described seeing her father molest young Susan Nason in the back of his Volkswagen van.

After Franklin released Susan, the girl walked several feet from the van, down a slope and crouched, crying, Franklin-Lipsker said. She told the jury that she then saw her father approach Susan, holding a rock above his head, and strike the girl.

Franklin-Lipsker told the jury that, a few moments later, she walked over to Susan’s slumped body.

“I saw blood . . . I saw hair that was no longer attached,” she said. “I saw something whitish. I saw blood.”

As she ran to her father’s van, Franklin grabbed her and knocked her to the ground, she said.

“He said ‘If you don’t stop this, I’ll have to kill you,’ ” she testified. “I was terrified but I absolutely believed him.”

In his opening statements last week, defense attorney Douglas Horngrad told the jury of eight women and four men that there is no evidence linking the former San Mateo firefighter to the murder.