3 beaten by police are acquitted in shooting

Three men who were videotaped being beaten and kicked by Philadelphia police last year were found not guilty yesterday on charges of attempted murder, aggravated assault, and conspiracy.

Dwayne Dyches, 26, Brian Hall, 24, and Pete Hopkins, 20, were charged after a shoot-out in the city's Feltonville section wounded three people May 5, 2008.

The men led police on a 21/2-mile chase that ended when officers dragged them from Hall's Mercury Grand Marquis near Second and Pike Streets and beat them as a Fox29 helicopter captured the scene.

Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey called the beatings "a black eye" on the department. Four officers were fired and 12 others disciplined or demoted.

After the verdict, the packed courtroom in the Criminal Justice Center erupted with cheers and applause from the defendants' friends and family.

Hopkins' attorney, Mary T. Maran, and Hall's attorney, Evan Hughes, said they were considering a federal civil-rights suit against the city.

Jurors leaving the building said the videotape of the beating, played in court numerous times, had no influence on their decision. The beating occurred while police were conducting a citywide manhunt for the killer of Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski.

"We threw [the videotape] out right at the beginning because we didn't think it had anything to do with the shooting," said a 19-year-old juror, a student who did not want to be identified by name.

Another juror, a 38-year-old therapist, said testimony by an undercover narcotics officer, Carlos Buitrago, had inadvertently crippled the prosecution's case.

Buitrago, who was staking out Fourth and Annsbury Streets, was the lone witness to the shoot-out. The three victims said they had not seen who fired 15 shots at them.

Buitrago was heard on a tape describing the events. At one point, he said four men had gotten out of the defendants' car. In another instance, he mentioned two black males, one of them "probably the shooter," who fled down a nearby alley.

Buitrago's final report did not include those observations.

"It's not like we didn't believe him," the juror said. "It's just that his story kept changing."

In addition, the juror said Assistant District Attorney Carol Sweeney had failed to connect the gun to Hopkins, the alleged gunman.

When the pistol was found 25 days later, there were no fingerprints on it, and investigators could not retrieve any DNA evidence.

The jury, five men and seven women, deliberated for four hours, said the forewoman, a 34-year-old educator.

When asked about the chase, the forewoman said the three men most likely had been afraid they would be beaten if caught by police.

"And what they were scared of happened," she said.