Stabbed to death in Olney
The insurance salesman, who also worked as a DJ, was getting out of his car.
Charles Fricker had his work and his passions - and, in middle age, the 52-year-old lover of classic rock and broadcast radio had begun to use his passions to help pay the bills.
In recent years, Fricker, a father of two from Waterford, Camden County, had landed a weekly gig as a disc jockey at WMGM-FM (103.7) in Atlantic City. And a few months ago, Fricker began part-time work doing traffic on KYW-AM (1060), his daughters said. He also had his own DJ business, spinning rock records at bars and parties across South Jersey.
Saturday morning, Fricker was killed in Olney while working his day job as a home insurance salesman.
About 9:50 a.m., police say, Fricker was getting out of his car near Third Street and Somerville Avenue when Eric Radcliff, 22, who was riding a bicycle and carrying a large butcher's knife, stabbed him twice in the chest during a robbery attempt.
Fricker stumbled onto Tabor Road and collapsed under a tree next to an outdoor church flea market.
He had been in the neighborhood to visit with clients.
An eyewitness followed Radcliff, of the 4800 block of North Lawrence Street, as he rode his bike to the nearby home of a friend on Mascher Street near Grange Avenue, police said. The witness then dialed 911, police said.
Police found Radcliff waving his knife in the basement. Officers Tasered him three times before he lunged at them and they shot him in the chest, killing him, police said.
Radcliff's mother declined to talk when she answered her door Monday.
Fricker's daughters, Amy, 26, and Laura, 24, remembered their father as a hardworking man who postponed his dream of becoming a radio DJ so he could support his family as an insurance salesman.
"He did everything he could to make sure his family was taken care of," Amy Fricker said. "He was loved by so many people."