16-year-old arrested in dirt-bike slaying
Eric Smith was charged with killing another teenager in Tacony Creek Park on Saturday for his $3,000 dirt bike.
Basic community policing is being credited with giving investigators the break that led them to arrest a 16-year-old boy in the fatal shooting of another teen, who was being robbed of his new dirt bike in Tacony Creek Park.
Eric Smith, of the 800 block of Granite Street in the Summerdale section, was charged yesterday as an adult with murder and robbery in the slaying of Luis Navarro Jr., also 16.
Chief Inspector Joseph Fox said that Smith did not know the victim and killed him Saturday evening because he wanted the teen's $3,000 Kawasaki motorcycle.
The break in the case came Monday when a citizen saw Smith and two other teens moving a motorcycle covered with a tarp in Summerdale, about a mile from the park, Fox said.
He said the man saw part of the bike and recognized it as the one being sought in the murder case.
The citizen then called 25th District Police Officer Jose Tirado, who said he knew the tipster through his community policing efforts, and alerted him to what he saw.
Tirado and Officer John Stokes went to the 800 block of Marcella Street, saw the three, and chased them into a house, where they were taken into custody.
Inside the house, police also found a handgun believed to be the murder weapon, Fox said. The gun is being traced to determine its origins.
Smith has not made a statement, but Fox said he had been "bragging" about what happened to others.
Based on interviews and other evidence, Fox said Smith was alone in the park when he saw Navarro riding his motorcycle in the park.
Smith, who has had run-ins with the police in the past, stopped Navarro at gunpoint, the chief said. Navarro tried to push the gun away, and Smith allegedly fired twice.
Navarro tried to ride off, but Smith fired again, hitting the victim, Fox said.
"There is some indication he may have fired another shot directly into the victim as he lay on the ground," Fox said.
He contrasted the help provided by the tipster with the actions of the mother of one of the youths "involved in this incident" who knew the cycle was in her house.
She "told her son repeatedly to get the bike out of the house - 'that bike belongs to that dead kid,' " Fox said. But she did not call police.
"I don't know what that says about the status of some of the parents in some of these cases," Fox said. "You can draw from it what you want to draw."
The woman and the other teens have not been charged. Fox said the investigation was continuing.
The arrest came as Navarro's survivors were making his funeral arrangements.
"It's not going to bring my brother back," Yanessa Navarro, who arrived home Monday on emergency leave from Army basic training, said of the arrest.
"But at least he's off the street," said Felix Aquilar, a family friend.
