One dead, two hurt in W. Phila. shooting
Mechanic Ron Vail was working on a van in a West Philadelphia auto-repair shop yesterday morning when he heard gunshots and a co-worker's cry.
Mechanic Ron Vail was working on a van in a West Philadelphia auto-repair shop yesterday morning when he heard gunshots and a co-worker's cry.
"I'm hit! I'm hit!" Vail recounted Anthony Harris as saying.
Harris was struck when, police said, two gunmen unleashed a volley of 20 shots at their intended targets: two other men in a car at a stoplight. Harris, 56, was hit by a stray bullet.
He was among three people taken to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania after the shooting. Thomas Frye, 20, of the 900 block of Flanders Road, the driver of a silver Pontiac Grand Prix, who was shot multiple times, was pronounced dead. His 24-year-old passenger suffered a leg wound. He was not identified by police. Both he and Harris were in stable condition.
As the shots continued, Vail said, he crawled toward Harris, who went down with a bullet wound to his lower right leg.
"I let him lay until the shots stopped ringing out," Vail said, "and then I called 911."
Homicide Capt. James Clark said: "It's unfortunate that something like this takes place in broad daylight - that they're brazen enough to fire 20 shots."
About 10:30 a.m., police were called to 55th and Walnut Streets, where two gunmen wearing jeans and dark hooded sweatshirts had used semiautomatic pistols to shoot at the occupants of the stopped car.
Harris was across the intersection at Larry's Auto Repair, where he has worked part-time as a mechanic for about three months. He had just arrived, said Larry Thomas, who owns the business.
The bullet-riddled Grand Prix rolled back on 55th until it struck a curb and stopped near Chancellor Street. A nearby Jeep was also pocked with bullet holes.
Witnesses said the passenger in the Grand Prix got out limping and was immediately arrested.
One young man at a nearby grocery referred to the dead man as a friend and "a good guy."
Clark said detectives were looking for a motive and trying to identify suspects. Anyone with information about the shooting is being asked to call homicide detectives at 215-686-3334.
