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Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Man killed in police-involved shooting

A 22-year-old man is dead after a police officer shot him after the man allegedly went for his partner’s weapon in Fern Rock last night, police said. At 8:44 p.m., two officers responded to a report of a man exposing himself near a home on Marshall Street near Spencer, said spokesman Lt. Frank Vanore. Police said that the man became combative and that a struggle ensued between him and one of the officers. During the struggle, police said, the man reached for the cop’s handgun, discharging it once. The clip fell from the gun and it was at that time the other officer fired at the man, striking him once in the chest, police said.

The man, who was not identified by police, was pronounced dead at the scene. Both officers were treated at Albert Einstein Medical Center for abrasions and one for a possible broken wrist.
 
Relatives and friends of the man, who they called “D. Vito” said he couldn’t have posed much of a threat to the cops.
 
“His knees were all messed up. He walked with a cane,” said one relative, who asked not to be identified. A childhood friend who lives on the block and also asked not to be named, said D. Vito was homeless and would sometimes stay at his place.
 
“He was having family problems,” he said.
 
Meanwhile, around the corner at Fisher Park, 7th and Spencer streets, investigators combed through foliage after reports of gunshots being fired there shortly after the fatal police-involved shooting earlier.
 
Further details will become available as investigation continues.
Posted by Dafney Tales @ 11:35 PM  Permalink | 1 comment
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About The PhillyConfidential team

Dana DiFilippo has covered murder, mayhem and miscellany at the Daily News since 2000. She grew up in Delaware County and studied journalism and photography at Penn State University. E-mail tips to difilid@phillynews.com.

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Stephanie Farr has been reporting for the Daily News since 2007, covering everything from gay porn stars who entered the burglary business to moon trees, skinheads, murders and naked bike rides. She covers crime, both in the city and suburbs, and keeps clippings of bizarre Associated Press articles. Her favorite this year was the story about the drunk in Punxsutawney who gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to a dead opossum. E-mail tips to farrs@phillynews.com.

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Phillip Lucas joined the Daily News crime team in 2011. He grew up on the mean streets of Seattle and studied journalism and psychology at Howard University in Washington, D.C. Before landing in the City of Brotherly Love, Phillip was a reporter for The News Journal in Wilmington, Del. Email tips to lucasp@phillynews.com.

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Morgan Zalot is the newest crime reporter at the Daily News, starting in 2011 after interning at the paper twice as a Temple University journalism student. In her past stints at the DN, she covered just about everything, from drunken Phillies fans to a barber shop in a high school to a grisly murder-suicide. She’s a born-and-raised Philly girl who grew up in the Northeast. E-mail tips to zalotm@philly.com.

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