Former Federal Prosecutor Jeremy Franker Recognized With U.S. Attorney General’s Award; Sworn In As 17th Judicial Circuit County Court Judge

Jeremy Franker, whose wife Kara Franker leads Visit Florida Keys as CEO and president, received the U.S. Attorney General's Award for Distinguished Service before being sworn in as a county court judge for the 17th Judicial Circuit on March 23, 2026. The honor, presented at the Attorney General's annual awards ceremony in Washington, D.C., ranks among the Department of Justice's most prestigious recognitions.

Franker spent seven years at the DOJ prosecuting organized-crime and racketeering cases, rising to deputy director of Joint Task Force Vulcan, a federal initiative targeting foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal networks. His work put national prosecutorial focus on Tren de Aragua, the Venezuelan gang that has expanded aggressively across the United States, and MS-13, the Salvadoran organization federal authorities have pursued across multiple jurisdictions for decades.

Before joining the DOJ, Franker served as a statewide prosecutor for the Florida Attorney General's Office, a role he took after beginning his legal career as an assistant state attorney in Miami. That South Florida grounding in state courts preceded nearly a decade of federal work spanning multiple districts.

The judgeship seats Franker on the bench in Broward County, home of the 17th Judicial Circuit, but his professional ascent carries particular resonance in Monroe County through Kara Franker, whose oversight of Visit Florida Keys places her at the center of the region's tourism economy. The connection pulls a figure with top-tier federal law-enforcement credentials directly into the Keys' civic network.

The organized-crime networks at the heart of Franker's DOJ career, particularly Tren de Aragua's documented northward expansion from South American origins through urban American corridors, have drawn sustained attention from federal and Florida law-enforcement agencies as trafficking operations increasingly reach beyond metropolitan hubs. With the swearing-in complete, Franker carries seven years of organized-crime trial experience from the prosecutorial table to the county court bench.