Wilbert Rosado-Ruiz, 63, was also convicted of four counts of attempted murder — three for other coworkers he wounded in the May 2024 shooting, and one for another man he attempted to shoot before his gun jammed.
Rosado-Ruiz had no reaction as the verdict was handed down by Delaware County Court Judge Kevin Kelly, who presided over the bench trial. Kelly will sentence Rosado-Ruiz in October. A conviction for first-degree murder carries a mandatory penalty of life in prison.
Leovanny Peña Peña, 30, and Giguenson Peña Peña, 26, were killed by Rosado-Ruiz during the shooting at Delaware County Linen, an industrial laundry facility where he had worked for 10 years. The three other victims were seriously wounded, including Charles Doyle, who said that he suffered severe internal injuries that have left him with limited use of his arms.
During his trial before Kelly, Rosado-Ruiz testified that he acted in self-defense: A group of his coworkers, including the Peña Peña brothers, cornered him inside the facility and threatened to kill him and his family.
The brothers, he said, were holding knives as they slowly walked toward him.
Prosecutors disputed Rosado-Ruiz’s version of events. Evidence from the scene, including surveillance footage and witness accounts, showed Rosado-Ruiz was the aggressor, screaming that he was “tired” of his coworkers during an argument near the facility’s time clock.
He then pulled out his 9mm handgun and opened fire, according to Nilamarie Valdivieso, the first person Rosado-Ruiz shot that morning.
In her closing arguments, Assistant District Attorney Sophia Polites said none of the victims were armed, and no weapons were recovered from the scene. She asserted that Rosado-Ruiz went room-to-room, searching for more victims as they fled from the initial gunfire, and at one point paused to reload his gun before continuing to fire.
Rosado-Ruiz intended to kill more people, according to the prosecutor, and would have done so had his gun not jammed. He fled the scene, and was arrested by a Trainer police officer not far from his home.
The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office said Thursday that the two prosecutors who accused DA Larry Krasner of encouraging them to act unethically in a controversial appellate case did so in a court filing that was both unauthorized and “ill-informed.”
In a court document filed late Thursday, written by Assistant District Attorney Thomas Gaeta and signed by Krasner, the office said prosecutors Katherine Ernst and Steven J. Wildberger acted inappropriately and without Krasner’s permission when they filed a brief Monday saying the office had a conflict in the appeal of Dennis Johnson, who is seeking to have his murder conviction overturned.
The office said it had taken steps to address all of the issues it saw with Johnson’s case, and that Ernst and Wildberger’s assertions were “ill-informed” and made without firsthand knowledge because they were no longer a part of the case.
The filing primarily focused on the steps the office took to ensure it was handling the case in a legal and ethical manner — and did not directly address the two prosecutors’ contentions that Krasner had asked them to “protect the office.”
In their filing Monday, Ernst and Wildberger said they tried to persuade Krasner to allow the state attorney general’s office to take over Johnson’s appeal after the prosecutor previously assigned to the case, Jaclyn Mason, recommended that his case be overturned — a recommendation the office later sought to reverse, saying Mason’s filing was full of false statements.
U.S. District Judge Paul S. Diamond then ordered a hearing on the matter. And in explosive testimony in federal court last week, Mason said she had sought to vacate Johnson’s conviction at the direction of her boss, Matt Stiegler — whom she accused of colluding with defense attorneys. Stiegler has said that was not the case.
Mason, who has since resigned, also said she was later told to lie about the case to minimize scrutiny of the office.
District Attorney Larry Krasner at a 2025 press conference. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
Ernst and Wildberger, who work in the law division of the DA’s office, said that as they were evaluating the case in the spring, they tried to encourage Krasner to refer the case to the state attorney general because of issues with how it was handled.
For example, they said, Stiegler, the supervisor who they believed had made mistakes while overseeing the case, was still offering legal advice about it from a different role in the office, which Ernst and Wildberger viewed as self-interested and “inappropriate” because of his potential interest in clearing his name rather than evaluating the case on its merits.
But Krasner’s office kept the case. And as they deliberated how to move forward, the two prosecutors wrote, Krasner told them “to litigate the case in a manner to ‘protect the office.’”
Then, in late June, Ernst and Wildberger wrote, they again asked Krasner to refer the matter to state prosecutors, but “DA Krasner stated that there would be ‘consequences’ for anyone who notified the court of the conflict issues.”
Ernst and Wildberger then filed a notice in federal court saying they believed the DA’s office was beset by conflicts and should not handle Johnson’s appeal.
Krasner’s team, in its first response to the matter this week, said that was not true.
Ernst and Wildberger, they said, were appropriately excluded from the case as soon as they disclosed a personal conflict with it, and did not have firsthand knowledge of the office’s discussions thereafter.
The prosecutors “are disqualified from filing or speaking on behalf of the Commonwealth” and were not authorized to file the “notice of conflict” or to speak for the office about the matter, they said.
Any discussions Ernst and Wildberger had with the office about the case are privileged conversations they should not be able to disclose, the DA’s filing said.
To remedy the issue, the office said, it has hired a new prosecutor to handle the case who has been walled off from the ongoing conversations. Assistant District Attorney Jean Peters-Baker, who recently joined the office and has spent more than 25 years as a prosecutor, will review Johnson’s case and decide if it has merit, the filing said.
Johnson was convicted of second-degree murder in 2009 in the shooting death of Kenyatta Smith during a robbery outside a North Philadelphia convenience store two years earlier. He was sentenced to life in prison.
Johnson appealed his conviction, in part because he said his trial attorney was ineffective. Mason filed court documents in 2022 agreeing with that assertion and saying Johnson’s conviction should be overturned.
But then, this spring, others in the office reviewed the case and took the opposite view.
Ernst and Wildberger said they were prepared to testify before Diamond about the situation. Others in the office are also expected to take the stand as the case proceeds.
The judge has not yet scheduled a date for testimony.
A Philadelphia man has been charged with fatally gunning down another man three years ago on a North Philadelphia street, authorities said Thursday.
A grand jury on Wednesday indicted Richard Pridgen, 21, on charges of murder, attempted murder, and related crimes for the 2023 shooting death of George Smith, according to the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office.
The case marks the third time state prosecutors have charged Pridgen with murder. He is currently serving a 17-year federal prison sentence for a separate crime.
In a news release Thursday, state prosecutors said Pridgen is a member of the “Backblock” gang, a violent North Philadelphia group that has been at the center of joint investigations by the attorney general’s office, the Philadelphia Police Department, and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives for years.
Just before midnight on April 22, 2023, two people attacked Smith, 27, in the 2400 block of North 17th Street, state prosecutors said. Surveillance cameras captured the killing, and showed one of the men — whom state prosecutors identified as Pridgen — firing multiple shots into Smith’s body before fleeing in a vehicle driven by a third person.
That vehicle, state prosecutors said, had been stolen at gunpoint the day before in the 2500 block of East Monmouth Street, less than four miles away.
The two other homicides Pridgen is accused of committing also occurred in 2023 in Philadelphia, state prosecutors said.
In one case, Pridgen is accused of shooting Hassan German, 31, and another man, who survived, on May 24, 2023, at the intersection of North Gratz Street and Susquehanna Avenue in North Philadelphia. The details of the other case were not immediately available on Thursday.
“There are public dangers, and then there is Richard Pridgen — for whom killing, stealing, and harming people is a way of life,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday said in the news release.
Pridgen has pleaded not guilty in both prior murder cases.
A spokesperson for the Defender Association of Philadelphia, which is representing Pridgen in those cases, declined to comment.
In February, Pridgen was convicted in federal court of two carjackings and sentenced to more than 17 years in federal prison.
In the carjackings — which also took place in 2023 in Philadelphia — Pridgen robbed two men of their vehicles at gunpoint, federal prosecutors said. Neither man was injured.
A Chester County man who forced two teenage girls, one of them a relative, to work long hours on a Kennett Square mushroom farm for no pay pleaded guilty Thursday to human trafficking, involuntary servitude, and related crimes.
Ramiro Caal Jolomna, 37, threatened to have the girls deported back to their homes in Guatemala if they did not comply with his demands, Senior Deputy Attorney General Zachary Mills Wynkoop said.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, whose office investigated the case through its human trafficking division, called crimes like Jolomna’s “cruel and dehumanizing behavior that forces victims into a routine of helplessness and silence.“
The victims, who were 14 and 17 when interviewed by state investigators in 2024, said Jolomna helped transport them to Chester County with a promise of giving them better lives and the opportunity to earn money to send back to their families.
Instead, prosecutors said, Jolomna, of New Garden Township, took their salaries from the mushroom farm for himself.
The younger victim told investigators that she had been working on the mushroom farm since she was 12 years old, and that Jolomna had been signing her paychecks over to himself and his wife.
After working predawn shifts at the farm, the girl was forced to act as the couple’s housekeeper, and was not even given new clothing to wear, Wynkoop said.
The other victim told investigators Jolomna charged her rent to live in his home alongside nine other people and forced her to reimburse him for the cost of her flight to America. These debts prevented her from sending money home to her father, who was sick and unable to work, the prosecutor said.
At one point, Jolomna’s parents contacted the older victim’s parents and asked them for more money, according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest. The girl said she “did not know what would have happened if her parents said no,” the document said.
In an interview with prosecutors, Jolomna admitted to having debts from “smuggling” the girls into the country and to taking the girls’ paychecks to use for food and other items, according to the affidavit.
Jolomna will be sentenced in the coming months by Chester County Court Judge Debra Ryan.
A well-known activist and founder of a Kensington anti-violence nonprofit was charged with aggravated assault and related crimes for attacking a woman with a box cutter during an argument on a SEPTA train last week, authorities said Thursday.
Rosalind “Roz” Pichardo, 48, was taken into custody days after the July 17 assault, which left the victim in critical condition with deep lacerations to her face and chestthat required more than 70 stitches to close, according to the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office, which is prosecuting the case.
Pichardo is the founder of Operation Save Our City, a nonprofit that offers social services to people who have experienced grief, addiction, or trauma from exposure to violence, according to the group’s website. She also runs “Sunshine House,” a storefront on Kensington Avenue where people in addiction can drop in for meals, clothes, and other forms of support.
She has been involved with other anti-violence and victim services organizations throughout the city and has received at least two city grants for her work.
Last week, one day before the assault, Pichardo touted a $20,000 grant that Operation Save Our City received from the Philadelphia Office of Public Safety.
And in 2024 and this year, the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office awarded Pichardo’s organization $25,000 and $10,000, respectively, through its violence prevention microgrant program.
Pichardo declined to comment Thursday. No attorney for her was listed in court documents.
Around 9 p.m. Friday on an eastbound SEPTA train near Eighth and Market Streets, prosecutors say, Pichardo assaulted a woman with a box cutter. They said the conflict began when the two women argued on a platform at the transit agency’s 15th Street Station.
The victim told investigators Pichardo “got smart with her” after she asked a man who was blocking a platform bench to move so she could sit down, according to an affidavit of probable cause for Pichardo’s arrest. She said she, in turn, “got smart” with Pichardo.
During the spat, the victim said, Pichardo complained about “how rude young people are” and called her entitled for asking the man to move.
The women then boarded the train, where the argument continued, and they “both got in each other’s face and started fighting each other,” the woman told investigators, according to the affidavit.
At some point during the scuffle, the woman said, Pichardo pulled out a box cutter and assaulted her. She told investigators she felt warmness on her face and felt “a lot of blood.”
The attack left the woman with severe lacerations on her cheeks and her chest that,in addition to needing stitches, required surgery to help her regain muscle movement, the documents said.
Pichardo was taken into custody by SEPTA transit police but released the same evening.
Investigators said technical issues initially prevented them from viewing surveillance footage captured within the train car, but they later recovered footage from an adjoining car that showed portions of the incident.
On Wednesday, Pichardo was charged with two counts of aggravated assault, simple assault, possessing an instrument of a crime, reckless endangerment, harassment, and disorderly conduct.
She was released from custody after posting 10% of $25,000 bail, court records show.
The case will be handled by the attorney general’s special prosecutor for mass transit, a position created by the state legislature to address what Republican lawmakers said was the failure of District Attorney Larry Krasner to prosecute violent crimes on or near SEPTA properties.
A spokesperson for Krasner’s office declined to commenton the case and referred questions to the attorney general.
Pichardo appeared to address the matter in cryptic posts on Facebook, where she frequently promotes her activist work to her 23,000 followers.
On July 18, one day after the assault, she posted a photo of a SEPTA train car with the caption: “Lord please give me strength to get through this pain.”
And on Wednesday evening around 9 p.m., she updated followers: “I’m Good .. I’m Home and trusting the process . My head is up..”
In addition to founding Operation Save Our City in 2012 and later Sunshine House, Pichardo has worked as a lead educator with the harm reduction nonprofit Prevention Point and as a trauma victims advocate in Temple University Hospital’s emergency department.
Staff writers Ellie Rushing, Aubrey Whelan, and Jillian Kramer contributed to this article.
Until last year, Philadelphia police detectives wrote search warrants on typewriters. Officers still take incident reports with pen and paper, and hand deliver them to detective bureaus. And when someone reports a minor crime, it can take hours for police to respond — if they do at all.
To Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel, those details capture something bigger: a department in need of a systems upgrade.
In a new five-year strategic plan released Thursday, Bethel broke from the tradition of his predecessors by treating the police department and its nearly $900 million budget as a business in need of modernizing — with an eye toward better “customer service” for residents — rather than centering on crime-fighting tactics like commanders of the past.
“If we’re going to be a modern police department,” he said in an interview this week, “we have to take on some of the structures of a modern business.”
To him, that involves tackling many of the less glamorous parts of police work: upgrading internal records systems, streamlining police report forms, and expanding training for officers.
But there are also some flashy — if not eyebrow-raising — initiatives within the 73-page plan: integrating artificial intelligence into 911 calls, allowing residents to report nonemergency crimes via video chat, and creating an internal diversion program for officers who violate low-level department policies.
Some parts of the plan — built on conversations with more than 200 people in the department, city leadership, and community — would be funded through grants, the department said, while others would need to be approved and funded by City Council, which has been largely amenable to Bethel’s budget requests in recent years.
The department said the long-term view “allows future needs to be considered through the normal budget process well before they arise.”
Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker and Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel speak at a press conference in 2024.Alejandro A. Alvarez / Staff Photographer
It has been one of Bethel’s signature undertakings since Mayor Cherelle L. Parker appointed him as Philly’s top cop in January 2024, part of a long history of police commissioners and mayors working together to craft long-term public safety plans to guide their administrative goals.
In 2012, then-Mayor Michael Nutter said the department would focus on confiscating illegal guns, and ramp up overtime to put more cops on the street. And in 2020, amid an unprecedented spike in gun violence, then-Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw outlined goals to increase the clearance rate for homicides and shootings.
Bethel’s plan, by contrast, is light on specifics for traditional crime fighting. While it broadly describes strategies like increasing foot patrols on SEPTA and expanding the use of digital forensic evidence in investigations, it does not set targeted reductions in homicides, shootings, or traffic deaths.
That, he said, was intentional.
“This plan is really not a crime plan. We have a crime plan. We’ve been covering it for a long time. We know that space of it,” he said. “But we’ve never done anything as an organization with, how do we move into being a modern and forward-thinking, always-evolving organization?”
That has likely given Bethel the rare breathing room to look past the crime stats that have defined past administrations and focus instead on the machinery behind them.
Here are some standout parts of the plan:
Illegally dumped trash piles up at South 56th and Hoffman Streets in Kingsessing in this 2024 photo. Residents would now have officers in their police district to specifically help address quality-of-life issues. Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
New quality-of-life officers
Quality-of-life concerns have long dominated community police meetings, Bethel said. So within the next two years, the department plans to install “quality-of-life officers” in every police district to be the point of contact for residents on issues like abandoned cars, illegal dumping, and nuisance businesses.
Those officers, Bethel said, would be responsible for coordinating calls with other city departments to more quickly resolve problems.
Report low-level crimes via video call
One of the biggest issues for the department, Bethel said, is poor “customer service.”
Officers typically juggle high-priority calls — like shootings and assaults — alongside reports of nonviolent crimes like petty theft, vandalism, or minor car crashes. Because the lower-level offenses are considered less urgent, officer response can sometimes take several hours, leaving residents frustrated.
Under the new system, he said, people would be able to report low-level crimes online and be provided with a link to a video chat with officers, who could take the report and send a copy to the caller digitally, with no in-person visit needed.
Filing a report over the phone will still be possible, he said, but for people who want to avoid an emergency call for minor issues, this is a new option.
The new system could start to roll out within the next year.
AI-assisted 911 calls
The department also plans to test 911 call systems that use artificial intelligence to screen calls.
When people call for help, they will be connected to an emergency dispatcher, with AI listening in the background. Callers who report lower-level crimes, like vandalism or theft, will be transferred to an AI-assisted line and have the option to report the matter online or via video call.
There will also be a separate, nonemergency phone number that will be answered by an artificial voice. The system will screen for keywords or issues linked to high-priority crimes, like a robbery or shooting, and immediately transfer those calls to a human dispatcher, the department said.
Bethel said the department is still evaluating potential pitfalls, and acknowledged the nuances: “A theft can turn into a robbery, and a robbery can turn into a shooting, a shooting can turn into a murder,” he said.
Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel inside the radio room at PPD headquarters in 2024.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
An internal diversion program
When city police officers violate department policy, their disciplinary cases are sent to the Police Board of Inquiry, and reprimands can remain on their record and affect future promotions unless appealed and overturned through union arbitration.
Under a new initiative, officers accused of lower-level violations could go through an internal diversion program that requires them to undergo training and avoids a mark on their record. Among those offenses are sleeping on duty, dismissive behavior, using derogatory or offensive language, or failing to activate body-worn cameras. In the latter case, Bethel said, the diversionary program would not be available for officers with repeated failures to turn cameras on.
Officers would not be eligible for diversion if they are found to have committed the same offense within the previous six months, or if the offense happened alongside more serious violations ineligible for the program.
Bethel said the diversion option was developed in coordination with the Citizens Police Oversight Commission with a goal of giving officers “a second chance, but also train them.”
Expand communication with the public
The department intends to develop transition plans when captains or commanders leave neighborhood police districts — something community leaders had requested, Bethel said.
It will also host quarterly community meetings to review data, and develop publicly available dashboards with additional crime, quality-of-life, and other types of data to measure performance.
By expanding points of contact with the community, Bethel said, “they’re going to hold us accountable.”
Breaking concrete, beeping trucks, and the hum of heavy machinery signaled movement Wednesday in the monthlong investigation into two missing persons last seen at a house on the 400 block of West Chew Avenue in Olney.
With that cacophony of construction sounds, the Philadelphia Police Department and the FBI began a planned excavation at the home of Eugene Albert Horsch, 44, who faces charges of carrying illegal firearms and fake federal law enforcement credentials following a June arrest. Horsch’s dilapidated twin home on West Chew Avenue has since been connected to the disappearances of at least two women in the last 10 years.
Authorities said they would excavate a portion of Horsch’s property with assistance from the Philadelphia Water Department. Investigators, officials said, were intent on unearthing and examining a pipe under the house as part of a widening probe.
Workers and police investigators dig and inspect a hole while removing pipes and debris at the entrance to the home of Eugene Albert Horsch on West Chew Avenue.Jose F. Moreno / Staff Photographer
“The general scope of the dig is to excavate and remove a pipe that will be subsequently examined by FBI and PPD forensics for any evidence that may be present,” Sgt. Eric Gripp, a police department spokesperson, said Monday.
That effort began in earnest before 9 a.m. Wednesday morning, with crews digging up what was once a small, overgrown garden in front of Horsch’s home, as well as the sidewalk and street in front of the property. Trucks and tents cropped up throughout the morning as investigators walked the block. Periodically, investigators inserted a white pole into the earth, measuring the depth of a hole.
Later in the morning, workers pulled a piece of pipe from the ground and took it inside the home.
Wednesday’s excavation was the latest development the case that began June 19, when Horsch was arrested near Independence Mall with drugs, guns, and other weapons, as well as a counterfeit U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration badge. A woman was with him at the time, and she was carrying a fake ID in the name of Blair Tonzelli, who was last seen at Horsch’s home in 2022.
Workers and police investigators dig and inspect a hole while removing pipes and debris at the entrance to the home of Eugene Albert Horsch.Jose F. Moreno / Staff Photographer
Since then, investigators have discovered a swath of evidence, authorities have said. Among the items found at the West Chew Avenue home were vats of chemicals, a 55-gallon drum with connections to water lines in the house’s basement, and what police sources called “a significant amount” of blood.
Forensic testing is continuing, and it has not yet been announced whether the blood is human. Horsch does not currently face charges involving violent crimes.
Additionally, authorities have found other fake IDs in Tonzelli’s name, as well as the missing woman’s bank card. Investigators have also said that Amy McHale, the ex-wife of Horsch’s late father, Raymond Horsch, was last seen at the Olney home in 2016, according to the woman’s family.
It was unclear Wednesday if investigators had linked any evidence to the disappearances of Tonzelli or McHale.
Workers and police investigators dig and inspect a hole while removing pipes and debris at the entrance to the home of Eugene Albert Horsch on Wednesday.Jose F. Moreno / Staff Photographer
The midweek excavation surprised some neighborhood residents. Cheri Smith lives two blocks from the site of the investigation, but still felt its effects. Smith, who has lived nearby for two decades, said she has felt unsettled since news of the investigation broke last month, and has seen little communication among police, the city, and neighbors.
“It’s a shame what happened,” Smith said. “It would be nice if they notified us that this work is going to be happening, but the city is going to do what they are going to do.”
Laurenza Moise said that when she arrived Wednesday to open her braiding business, the corner of Fifth Street and Chew Avenue had already been blocked off. Since the investigation began, she said, she has seen a reduction in business.
“When they close the street, my business goes down, and there’s no parking for customers,” Moise said. “What can I do other than mind my business?”
The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office is investigating ties between one of DA Larry Krasner’s top advisers and a man serving life in prison after prosecutors learned that the official sent the man money years ago and did not disclose it.
G. Lamar Stewart, chief of external engagement and government affairs in the DA’s office, said he sent $100 to Anthony Sutton in January 2021 to support Sutton’s mentorship program, “Mann Up,” for men incarcerated at State Correctional Institute Phoenix.
Sutton, 61, who is serving life in prison for killing a man in Germantown in 1984, has been appealing his conviction for more than a decade.
The issue came to light last week, after the prosecutors assigned to Sutton’s appeal were reviewing his prison records and noticed that Stewart was among those who had sent Sutton money in recent years.
The records showed Stewart did so only once, Krasner said.
The payment raised concerns, in part because Stewart had organized and participated in meetings between Sutton’s defense attorney, Krasner, and prosecutors about the case, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Krasner’s office has opposed Sutton’s appeal and said his profession of innocence lacked merit.
When the prosecutors discovered the payment, it was quickly brought to the attention of Krasner, who then asked his office’s special investigation unit to investigate, according to multiple sources familiar with the case. The inquiry remains ongoing.
Stewart, who is also senior pastor of Taylor Memorial Baptist Church in Nicetown-Tioga, was working as the head of the office’s community engagement unit at the time of the donation. In an interview, he said he used his own money to support Sutton’s program as part of the faith-based charitable work he does to assist families and community organizations across the region every holiday season.
“I thought that the work that they were doing was positive, transformative, and it was geared to helping reduce violence in Philadelphia and to make communities and families whole,” he said.
He said he did not know of any way to reach the organization other than to send it through Sutton directly. “I was very intentional to make sure that my name was listed because when you’re not trying to hide anything, you just do things above the board,” he said.
District Attorney Larry Krasner (left) and G Lamar Stewart, head of the Community Engagement and Government Affairs at the DA’s Office, outside the President’s House in Independence National Historical Park in February 2026.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
During a brief hearing in Sutton’s case on Monday, Assistant District Attorney David Napiorski, supervisor of the office’s law division, told Common Pleas Court Judge Giovanni O. Campbell that his attorneys needed additional time to investigate Sutton’s case after they found that someone in the office had put “money on the defendant’s books in prison.”
“That needs to be investigated by the office thoroughly before we can take any further action,” Napiorski told the judge.
Stewart said he did not try to influence the outcome of the appeal or advocate for Sutton. He acknowledged that he attended at least one meeting about Sutton’s case, but said his job requires him to coordinate and attend meetings with Krasner.
Krasner said that he saw no issue with Stewart’s donation or subsequent participation in meetings, and that his office’s inquiry and prosecutors’ comment in court Monday “establishes integrity.”
“G. Lamar Stewart gave a small amount of money for an organization … and then this office decided to oppose Mr. Sutton’s request. Where’s the issue?” he asked.
He added: “Any rock we haven’t flipped yet, we will flip. Preliminarily, it seems quite clear that this was a donation given for a completely legitimate purpose.”
Sutton did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent through a messaging app for people in prison. His attorney, Jason Javie, said Tuesday that he did not know anything about Stewart’s payment to Sutton and declined to discuss the matter further.
“My focus is 110% on the exoneration of Mr. Sutton,” he said.
The revelation comes amid mounting scrutiny over Krasner’s office’s handling of post-conviction matters. In a forceful ruling last month, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court said Krasner’s office had a pattern of misleading judges when seeking to overturn old murder convictions.
Last week, in a separate, controversial federal appellate case, a former assistant district attorney in Krasner’s office said prosecutors were “colluding” with defense attorneys to find the most effective way to have the murder conviction thrown out. And then, on Monday, in a striking court filing in that same contentious case, two supervisors in the law division said Krasner had instructed them to litigate the matter in a way that would “protect the office.”
And now, the office is investigating a case connected to Stewart, who has worked in the DA’s office since 2019 and is one of Krasner’s most trusted advisers.
District Attorney Larry Krasner at a press conference in May, denouncing criticism of his office leveled by Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer
Stewart, who is paid $154,500 annually, oversees the office’s community engagement, public affairs, and communications strategies, and acts as a conduit between Krasner and other public officials. Since Robert Listenbee retired as first assistant district attorney in January, Krasner has not named a successor — and several prosecutors say Stewart, who is not a lawyer, has effectively absorbed parts of that job. He often helps coordinate sensitive matters in cases, including relocating victims and witnesses.
He is respected by many in city government and across the community. Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, speaking at Krasner’s inauguration ceremony in January, mentioned Stewart as one of the office’s most essential staffers.
“District Attorney Krasner, as a moment of personal privilege, I want you to know that G. Lamar Stewart is one of the most committed, committed, committed members of your team in engaging in community outreach, and he represents you well, sir,” she said to applause.
Stewart, born and raised in Germantown and North Philadelphia, served in the U.S. Army and worked for the Philadelphia Police Department before joining Krasner’s team in 2019. At his church, he runs a nonprofit called Taylor Made Opportunities that offers job support and mentorship to young men in the neighborhood, and supports families of homicide victims.
Stewart said he donates to community organizations, and provides meals, Christmas gifts, and other means of support to crime victims’ families each year, using his personal money.
He does not typically disclose those donations to the DA’s office, he said, and it has never been a problem.
“My Christian faith is rooted in giving, in love, in showing up for the least of these, showing up for those who have been harmed, for showing up for those who are trying to rehabilitate and be accountable for the harm they caused to bring healing to our community,” he said. “For anyone to suggest that me giving through a faith lens, in the interest of good for community, is problematic for me, that is an infringement upon my faith tradition and my religious rights.”
Krasner said he did not think it was necessary for Stewart — or other employees in the office — to disclose donations.
“I don’t know that it makes sense to require 700 employees, especially if they’re doing so on a faith basis, to disclose everyone they give donations to,” he said. “It’s certainly something we could think about.”
In Stewart’s case, his money went to support a program run by Sutton, better known as Benny Doo, who was sentenced to life in prison after a jury convicted him of first-degree murder in the shooting death of Richard Berry in the Pelham section of Germantown in December 1984. In the early 1980s, prosecutors said, Berry hired Sutton and other members of his crew, called the “Ghostbusters,” to retrieve jewelry that had been stolen from him, and agreed to pay with “a few ounces of blow and a couple thousand dollars.”
Berry never paid up, and after he started avoiding Sutton and his crew, Sutton killed him, prosecutors said.
But Sutton said prosecutors violated his right to a fair trial when they failed to turn over police documents — including polygraph results and police interviews with several witnesses — to his defense attorney. One man who testified at trial has also since come forward to recant his testimony.
Prosecutors, in a court filing in May, said Sutton failed to show how those issues could have changed the outcome of his trial. His appeal, prosecutors wrote, was untimely and lacked merit.
A Chester man who recruited his friend to carry out the execution of a criminal rival in June 2024, only to have that friend die during the botched ambush, was convicted of first-degree murder by a Delaware County jury.
Jesse Allen Jr., 20, was charged with the murder of Zaheem Sabree, even though he did not fire the shot that killed him, under the legal theory of transferred intent. The person who pulled the trigger, Tyjohn Walker-Jones, 18, was the target of Allen and Sabree, who were out for revenge after Walker-Jones allegedly killed their friend weeks earlier.
Text messages presented during Allen’s three-day trial showed that he had begun plotting Walker-Jones’ death immediately after the murder of Sabrie “Breezy” Pierce.
“Everybody gone pay,” Allen said in the message, displayed in court.
Surveillance footage from a nearby deli recorded Allen and Sabree walking together down 24th Street on the day of the shooting, then hiding nearby — Allen in shrubbery and Sabree behind a concrete wall. Moments later, Walker-Jones is seen on the video walking through the area and then ducking behind a parked car as the gunfire rang out, prosecutors said.
Shell casings found at the scene showed that Walker-Jones and Sabree shot at each other multiple times — Sabree with a .45-caliber pistol and Walker-Jones with a 9mm, prosecutors said. Walker-Jones and Allen then fled in opposite directions.
Sabree was found near that scene, shot in the head. Police took him to Crozer-Chester Medical Center, where he was later pronounced dead.
The jersey of Chester High School football player Zaheem Sabree hangs on the fence while the Chester High School before a game in August 2024. Sabree was gunned down in Chester during the botched ambush of another teen.Yong Kim / Staff Photographer
Allen’s attorney, Brian Malloy, urged jurors in his closing arguments to acquit his client. The real killer, he said, was Walker-Jones, who, while awaiting trial in Pierce’s murder, was given a “two-for-one deal” by prosecutors.
During Allen’s trial, Walker-Jones, who was not charged in connection with Sabree’s death, took the stand and admitted to shooting Sabree in the head.
“He knows he has to play along, say what he has to say, but actions speak louder than words,” Malloy said. “We watched videos of him killing two people, and he’s not sitting at this table, and that’s a crazy thing.”
Malloy suggested that Walker-Jones was the aggressor, chasing Allen and Sabree as they walked through Chester.
But Deputy District Attorney Matt Krouse said Allen took deliberate steps to plan the ambush and was directly responsible for Sabree’s death.
Allen directed Sabree, a star football player at Chester High School and an honors student at STEM Academy, to wear all black and meet him at a deli in Walker-Jones’ neighborhood, which was nowhere near his own, Krouse said. He deliberately left his cell phone at a friend’s house, knowing his movement would be tracked.
And after the shooting, Allen, in text messages, bristled at the rumor circulating through Chester that he had left his wounded friend to die, saying he had no choice.
“He knew already on June 30, 2024 that he was guilty of everything he was charged with,” Krouse said. “But just like he ran from his so-called best friend to avoid the consequence of his actions, that’s what he’s trying to do today and this week.”
Allen is to be sentenced in October. Walker-Jones’ trial in the death of Sabrie Pierce is scheduled to be held later this year.
A 41-year-old woman was killed and a 5-year-old child injured after the woman allegedly fled from a police traffic stop and crashed a vehicle into a tree early Monday, the Gloucester County Prosecutor’s Office said.
The woman was identified as Holly Hageman, but no other information about her was released. The child’s injuries were not life-threatening, the prosecutor’s office said.
Just after 11:55 p.m. Sunday, Mantua Township police conducted a vehicle stop for a traffic violation on southbound Route 55.
While one officer was standing with the driver outside the vehicle, another officer ordered Hageman, who was a backseat passenger, to exit the vehicle, the prosecutor’s office said.
“Instead, Hageman climbed into the driver’s seat and drove away at a high rate of speed. Also present in the vehicle at the time was a 5-year-old child,” the prosecutor’s office said.
Police lost track of the vehicle and transported the driver to the Mantua Township Police Department.
Mantua police were then notified by the New Jersey State Police that Hageman had crashed into a tree about three miles from the original traffic stop and suffered fatal injuries, the prosecutor’s office said.
