Philadelphia Inquirer
PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia police conducted a massive manhunt yesterday for two people who shot an off-duty officer in his leg and killed his childhood friend in an apparent robbery gone wrong.
Detectives also were waiting to interview the officer, Martin Campbell, 23, who remained heavily sedated after surgery at Temple University Hospital.
Campbell, shot in the left leg, was bleeding badly when he arrived at Temple on Wednesday night. The bullet nicked an artery, police said, and he was initially in critical condition. His condition was upgraded to stable yesterday.
Authorities also said two people arrested Wednesday night - one of whom allegedly pulled a gun on police and was shot by an officer - were not the men who confronted Campbell and two of his friends in the 4400 block of North Marshall Street.
Campbell and childhood friend Rasheen Allen had grown up on that block, in the city’s Hunting Park section. Allen, shot once in the head, was declared dead at the scene. Police have not identified the third man, other than to say he was another friend from the neighborhood.
The would-be robbers approached the group about 7:30 p.m. One put a gun to Allen’s head and announced a robbery, saying something along the lines of, “You know what this is,” police said.
Allen pushed the gun away, and after a “slight scuffle,” three shots rang out, said Capt. James Clark, head of the Homicide Division.
Campbell and Allen were each hit once. The third man was not injured. The assailants got nothing in their robbery attempt, Clark said.
“I think it was a random act,” he said. “For whatever reason, they targeted them.”
Campbell, who has been on the force for two years, was carrying his gun. “It probably happened so quickly that he didn’t get the chance to draw his weapon,” Clark said.
Campbell and Allen grew up three doors away from each other. Neighbors said Allen’s parents had moved away, but that Campbell’s mother still lives in his childhood home.
Dolores Anglero, who lives across the street, was on her porch with her daughter and young grandson when the guns went off.
“I saw them grow up,” she said of Allen and Campbell. “To see them laying there bleeding on the ground, and you couldn’t do anything - it’s a tragedy, awful tragedy.”
As children, Allen and Campbell played with all of the neighborhood kids, she said. Even after Allen’s parents moved, she saw him return to the neighborhood often, sometimes attending block parties.
Campbell, she said, visits his mother frequently, sometimes daily.
“To me, all of them are good kids,” she said.
There was no answer at Campbell’s childhood home yesterday afternoon.
Allen, of the 1300 block of Barnett Street, had a history of drug and assault arrests, but his record has been clean since 2004, according to court records.
There was no indication that his past trouble played any part in the shooting. The assailants did not appear to know Allen, Campbell, or the third friend, Clark said.
Relatives said Wednesday that Allen, 30, had been on disability from a job at SEPTA, but SEPTA could not confirm his employment yesterday due to the holiday.
Campbell walked a beat in his old neighborhood for several months after leaving the academy.
For little more than a year, he has been a patrol officer in the Fifth District, covering Roxborough and Manayunk, where his captain described him as “aggressive in his duties.”
“By all indications, he’s on the right path to becoming an excellent officer,” Capt. John Cerrone said. “This is exactly what we’re looking for . . . cops who come into an assignment and immediately get plugged in.”
Cerrone said that because of Campbell’s zeal, he had been detailed occasionally to higher-crime districts, and had been given plainclothes assignments to address a spate of burglaries in the Fifth District, an opportunity rarely afforded to young officers.
“He has been the first to step up for these details,” Cerrone said.
Police also announced charges yesterday against Tyreek Maxwell, 18, the man accused of pulling a gun on an officer.
Maxwell and another man were arrested Wednesday night after two officers thought they fit the description of the two who had shot Campbell and Allen.
Bomb-squad officers spotted the men about 10 p.m. in the 1100 block of West Venango Street, about a mile from the shooting.
The officers ordered both men to put their hands on a wall. One man complied; Maxwell drew a gun and was shot in the groin, police said.
Maxwell, of the 3500 block of North 11th Street, was taken to Temple, where he was in stable condition yesterday. He faces aggravated-assault and other charges.
The second man was questioned, but he was not expected to be charged.
Maxwell had been found guilty Dec. 2 of four gun charges, but was allowed to remain free pending a sentencing hearing Feb. 22.
U.S. marshals, who are assisting in the manhunt, posted a $5,000 reward for information leading to arrests.
“We have several leads we’re following, but we’re going to need the public’s help,” Clark said. “We think someone saw these individuals fleeing the scene.”
Police said the assailants had worn dark clothes and hooded sweatshirts. One was about 5-foot-1 or 5-2 and appeared to be in his late teens. The other was about 5-9 and looked to be in his early or mid-20s.
The taller one fired on Campbell and Allen, police said.
Copyright 2009 Philadelphia Inquirer