Six killed, more wounded in wave of weekend violence in Philadelphia

Six people were killed in Philadelphia between Friday morning and Sunday night — five shot and one stabbed — in a wave of violence across the city, according to police.

At least two others were wounded in the spate of attacks, a jarring stretch of violence in a year that has otherwise been among the least deadly Philadelphia has recorded in decades.

At a news conference on Monday, District Attorney Larry Krasner acknowledged the weekend’s toll but pointed to the city’s steep drop in killings, arguing that a brutal few days had not erased months of historic progress.

“We had a bad weekend,” Krasner said. “We’re not having a bad year.”

As of Monday, Krasner said, there had been 108 homicides so far this year in the city — 29 fewer than at the same time last year.

Even so, the six deaths amounted to more than 5% of the city’s homicides this year, a striking toll for a single weekend. The victims ranged in age from 26 to 70.

The bloodshed began shortly after 9 a.m. Friday, when officers responded to a report of a gunman on the 2100 block of North 20th Street in North Philadelphia West and found Savion Young, 31, shot in the chest and arm. He was pronounced dead at Temple University Hospital about 20 minutes later, police said.

That same evening, Felix Serrano, 70, was found shot inside a BMW on the 4300 block of North Seventh Street in Hunting Park, according to police. Investigators believe Serrano’s vehicle may have traveled a short distance after he was shot before his car struck a parked vehicle. He was also pronounced dead at Temple University Hospital.

The killings resumed before dawn Sunday. At about 3:20 a.m., police who were called to the 800 block of West Oxford Street in Ludlow found Rafi Colón-White, 30, shot in the head inside a Subaru Outback.

Colón-White was pronounced dead at Temple University Hospital. A 34-year-old man who arrived separately at the hospital with gunshot wounds to his legs was in critical condition, police said. That man, whom police have not identified, was also a victim in the shooting, said police spokesperson Cpl. Jasmine Colón-Reilly.

Sunday evening brought three more killings in as many hours. About 8:20 p.m., a man was fatally stabbed on the 500 block of West Courtland Street in Logan, and pronounced dead at Einstein Medical Center, police said. He has not been publicly identified.

Less than an hour later, DaJuan Coffee, 26, was shot multiple times on the 2000 block of East Lehigh Avenue in East Kensington and pronounced dead at Temple University Hospital, police said.

The weekend’s final killing came at about 11:49 p.m. Sunday. Officers sent to the 2800 block of North 24th Street in Strawberry Mansion for a report of a person with a gun found Michelle Wilson, 61, on a porch, shot in the neck and back, police said. She was pronounced dead moments later.

Wilson’s husband was also on the porch and was shot, but survived, police said. They did not share the man’s condition, but said he was stable.

Loved ones lingered on the sidewalk in front of the North 24th Street house Monday afternoon, hugging, trying to find comfort in one another amid their grief. They declined to be interviewed.

A 71-year-old neighbor said the family has lived on the block for decades.

“They were quiet people,” said the woman, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisal. On Sunday afternoon, she said, Wilson’s family had a barbecue, with children and extended family playing on the porch.

Surveillance video from a business on the block, reviewed by The Inquirer, showed a man wearing a hat and surgical face mask walking down the street when he appeared to take a black handgun from his bag and slip it into his jacket. The video showed him then calmly walk up to the porch and open fire.

Police have not shared the video with the public, nor identified the man captured in it as a suspect.

Nearby, on North 20th Street, an array of candles, stuffed teddy bears, and handwritten posters lay Monday across the sidewalk where Young was killed Friday morning.

Police said Young and his girlfriend were arguing outside the apartment around 9:10 a.m. when the woman’s 16-year-old brother pulled a gun and shot Young multiple times, police said. He died at the hospital.

The teen is wanted for murder.

Tributes for Young, also known as Apex, poured across social media over the weekend, and hundreds gathered in North Philadelphia for a balloon release.

Young had a daughter and large family scattered across the city, friends said. He had just started a clothing brand called Bad English, and neighbors said he was frequently seen lifting weights and working out outside his rowhouse.

“This was his Planet Fitness,” a man who trained with him said Monday on the block. The man, who declined to give his name for privacy reasons, looked down at the dozens of candles melting into the sidewalk beneath a collection of silver balloons. “He will be truly missed,” he said.

William Fritze, chief of the district attorney’s office Gun Violence Task Force, declined to provide additional information on the incidents, citing ongoing investigations.

No arrests have been made in any of the cases, said Colón-Reilly. Police are asking anyone with information to contact the department’s homicide unit at 215-686-3334, or its tip line at 215-686-TIPS.

Last year marked Philadelphia’s fewest homicides in nearly six decades, with 222 people killed. The last time the city’s homicide numbers fell below that mark was in 1966, when there were 178 murders.

During Monday’s news conference, called to announce grants awarded to more than 20 anti-violence organizations in the city, Krasner called the weekend’s violence a tragedy that “no one would ever celebrate,” even as he stressed that the city remained far safer than in years past.

“The facts are clear: Homicides are way down,” he said. “In almost every category, crime is down.”