Bus driver tells police he did not see hit-run victim

Lots of people come to G-Town Radio, a tiny nonprofit station based in Germantown, hoping to host their own show. Most have good ideas, says manager Jim Bear. But only a few know how to make them work on the air.

Joseph Heard, 46, killed in a hit-and-run crash in Center City on Tuesday, knew how to make it work.

For a year and a half, he had been the host of G-Town's Science 2.0, a show that discussed "science for the rest of us." With a degree in applied mathematics from Syracuse University, and experience as a research assistant at the U.S. Department of Energy, he grasped complex topics with ease, Bear said.

But his real talent lay in explaining those concepts to his listeners - the way he made them understand science and enjoy it, too, his colleagues said.

They said they were shocked by his death Tuesday, outside Police Headquarters on Franklin Square. A tour bus making a left turn onto Franklin Street hit Heard, who was crossing in the crosswalk on his way to a kidney dialysis appointment.

Heard was dragged 50 feet by the bus, and left bloodied and unresponsive in the street. The driver continued onto the I-95 on-ramp on his route to Washington.

When his bosses summoned him to return to the city Tuesday afternoon, he told investigators he had not realized he hit anyone.

Police said the driver, Walter Jefferson, 66, has been cooperating and an investigation is ongoing. Investigators are obtaining a warrant for Jefferson's cellphone to see whether he was using it at the time of the crash, and are trying to track down and interview the 19 passengers on his bus at the time of the accident.

It's too soon to say whether charges will be pressed, said Capt. John Wilczynski of the accident investigation unit. The District Attorney's Office will make the final decision, he said.

Wilczynski said passengers on the bus, which has no rear windows, likely did not see anything.

But the bus lurched when it hit Heard, and the driver should have felt that, the captain said.

Investigators were able to track the bus through video from Police Headquarters. The company that owns the bus, Yep Tours, told police the bus was on its normal route to Washington.

In June, NBC10 Philadelphia reported that over the previous two years, the company had received 25 unsafe-driving violations and had been involved in one accident.

Jefferson has had a commercial driver's license since 1996, and has a mostly clean record except for a moving violation for failing to yield in 2012, police said.

Officials at Yep did not return a call for comment Tuesday.

At G-Town Radio, Heard's colleagues remembered him as a man excited to share his passion for the sciences with others - especially young people, people of color, and those from disadvantaged backgrounds.

"He grew up in North Philadelphia, and he knew that a kid from those neighborhoods could fall in love with science and have a very fulfilling career," Bear said.

In an email, Heard's aunt wrote that he had taken to the sciences at an early age - "a math whiz," she called him.

She said his family was "in disbelief."

Heard had pitched his show to G-Town Radio 18 months ago and quickly took to broadcasting. Bear said he usually warns first-time hosts that their first show will be "a train wreck."

Heard, in response, did his first episode on the science of train wrecks.

"His astonishing expertise was not only that he knew about the physical universe, but that he explained it perfectly to people who did not have his depth of understanding," said Ed Feldman, the host of G-Town's Morning Feed.

Heard's show, which he originally hosted with his sister, mixed interviews with local scientists and researchers with conversation, current events, and "the hottest hip-hop and R&B," the show's website read. On his last show, he interviewed an astronomy professor, and played Drake and Meek Mill tracks during breaks.

"People loved coming on his show," Bear said.

He was the only broadcaster at the station, he said, who received thank-you notes from his guests.