JCPS board recognizes bus driver who confronted angry father who boarded bus

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Timothy Franklin earned some new monikers after putting himself between the elementary students on his bus and an angry father who boarded the vehicle on Aug. 26.

“They call me Mr. Famous, Captain America,” Franklin told WDRB News, noting he wore a Captain America shirt that day.

Franklin was recognized Tuesday by the Jefferson County Board of Education for handling the tense situation and safely getting students back to Carter Traditional Elementary immediately after.

Delvantae King, who boarded Franklin’s bus and threatened to “flip this whole bus and everybody on it,” faces charges of terroristic threatening, disorderly conduct and menacing after the incident. He has said he regrets how he handled the situation and that he was defending his daughter after she was bullied.

Franklin said he had separated the two girls involved, seating one at the front of the bus and the other at the back.

“His daughter was in the front, and as I’m pulling up to the stop, that’s when basically all hell broke loose,” Franklin said, noting that he believed criminal charges were appropriate in response to the situation.

Timothy Franklin JCPS bus driver.jpg — Timothy Franklin

Franklin says that moment unfolded “like a movie.”

“And scene, here we go,” he said. “I knew it was going to be a situation before I left the actual school, and when I pulled up to the stop, it all just went from zero to 10 that quick.”

Bus drivers get student management training, but Franklin said his natural instinct to protect the children on his bus clicked on in that moment.

“You’re not getting past me,” he said. “I don’t care what you do. If I’ve got to put my life on the line for it, that’s what’s going to happen.”

“I didn’t have time for fear,” he said. “I didn’t have time for anything but to get him off that bus.”

The response as video and coverage of the incident circulated caught him by surprise, he said.

“I have people calling me from different states, my family back home calling me like, ‘Are you OK?’” Franklin said.

Franklin has been driving four years for JCPS and took on his new route this year, and he resisted when his supervisor tried to put him on a new run in the aftermath of the Aug. 26 incident.

“The parents called and said, ‘No, please leave him there,’ and I have been there since day one, and I’m not going to leave my kids behind,” Franklin said. “… I look forward to seeing them every morning and every afternoon.”

Related Stories: