4 teens jailed in Phila. subway attack

The four teens charged this week with murder in the random attack on Sean P. Conroy in a Center City subway concourse were jailed without bail yesterday as the lawyer for the youth arrested on the day of the crime said his client was not involved in the beating.

Attorney John B. Elbert said Kinta Stanton, 16, was with the group that pounced on Conroy in the 13th Street subway station on March 26 but was standing 10 or 15 feet away. "He tells me he stood there in shock and did not know what to do," the Center City lawyer said, adding that Stanton, who was arrested shortly after the attack, had given the names of his companions to investigators.

Meanwhile, the pastor, friends and family of one of the other youths - Arthur Alston, 16 - expressed disbelief that he had been arrested.

"He was a good student," said his stepfather, Gregory Moore. "He didn't tell us anything about this, though. We were caught off guard."

Police, who said that they knew the identities of the other suspects last week, arrested Alston and two other teens Wednesday at Simon Gratz High School, in the Nicetown section of North Philadelphia, and found the fourth at home.

All five are charged as adults with murder in the death of Conroy, 36, a Starbucks manager who suffered a fatal asthma attack when he was punched and kicked on a whim, officials said. Police are still investigating the sequence and number of blows suffered by Conroy and who delivered them.

Lawyers said charging all the suspects with murder was not unusual and was based on the crime of conspiracy, which holds that members of a plot are legally responsible for the acts of other members.

"There's no prohibition to charging them [with murder] as long as there's sufficient factual evidence of an agreement to participate in a crime," said Guy R. Sciolla, a veteran Center City criminal defense lawyer not involved in the case. "Of course, they still have to prove it at trial.

"In this particular case, the tragedy is that this stressful situation brought on a fatal asthmatic attack," Sciolla said. Had the victim not died as a result of the attack, he said, the alleged assailants would have been charged with conspiracy, aggravated assault, and recklessly endangering another person.

The Gratz students' arrests come during one of the most critical times in the school's calendar. Eleventh graders at the 1,350-student school are taking the high-stakes Pennsylvania System of State Assessment test this week in reading and math. How Gratz performs will determine the school's fate under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

One Gratz educator, who asked not to be named, said the administration had tried to keep the focus on the testing despite the influx of police who entered the school to make the arrests.

"I don't see it affecting the school that much," he said.

The Philadelphia School District issued a statement yesterday saying: "Students, teachers and staff are doing an admirable job in staying focused on learning and teaching."

It said the district and school were providing help to students who "have expressed concern, anxiety and distress given the serious charges being faced by their fellow students and the intense media focus."

Though the school's performance on the PSSA last spring was less than stellar, Gratz is not among the worst-performing high schools in the city. Fifty-seven percent of the school's 11th graders scored below basic levels in reading last year and 53 percent in math.

Gratz, one of Philadelphia's large neighborhood high schools, has been one of the district's more stable schools in recent years. Its student body is nearly all African American and more than 80 percent of the students come from low-income families.

At a predawn hearing held via closed-circuit television, Alston, of the 800 block of Fisher Avenue; Ameer Best, 17, of the 2000 block of North 24th Street; Rasheem Bell, 16, of the 4700 block of Tampa Street; and Nashir Fisher, 16, of the 3500 block of North Marvine Street, were ordered held without bail pending a court hearing Wednesday.

Public court records indicate that only Bell has a previous run-in with the law, a conviction for retail theft last year.

Lawyer Elbert said Stanton, a 10th grader at Gratz, did not skip school March 26 as has been alleged, but went to Center City after his last class to get his cell phone fixed.

There, he ran into three other Gratz students he knew and a fourth teen he did not know, the lawyer said.

"Eventually, they went down in the subway, and he thought they were heading for a train to go back home," Elbert said. "He got separated from the group and was about 10 to 15 feet behind them when they attacked the victim."

Stanton ran away and was arrested a short time later by SEPTA Police Officer Omari Bervine, a two-year veteran of the force.

"He's very distraught," Elbert said of his client. "He's never been away from home."

The lawyer said Stanton was "well liked," had no prior arrests, and had taken part in community activities such as neighborhood cleanups.

At Alston's home, Moore, his 57-year-old stepfather, answered the door, toys visible in the living room behind him.

"He was a member of Triumph Baptist Church, right near Gratz," Moore said. "He was just beginning to turn his life around. He had received things from colleges and was involved in the church choir. He also played basketball for a church team."

Elizabeth Love and Sierra Gaynor, both 16, who attend Dobbins Career and Technical Education High School, said they knew most of the teens charged in the attack.

"We all grew up together," Gaynor said. "Nobody knows how it happened. He could have had that asthma attack for many reasons."

Love said she knew Alston from Triumph Baptist Church, on the 1600 block of West Hunting Park Avenue.

"He didn't pick on nobody," she said. "He didn't start fights. He was an awesome athlete. When I heard it, I couldn't believe it. I refuse to believe it."

The Rev. James S. Hall, pastor at Triumph, said he also was taken aback when he heard that Alston was among those arrested.

Hall said Alston never had any problems with anyone at the church.

Gaynor called suspect Fisher "a sweetheart," and Shanice Johnson, 16, a Gratz student, said he was a "quiet kid."