From the Source

Murder charges pending in Piazza slayings

The attorney for a man police have accused of planning a drug robbery that left two people dead at a posh Northern Liberties apartment complex said today that detectives are preparing to file murder charges against his client.

13 comments

Murder charges pending in Piazza slayings

POSTED: Tuesday, July 14, 2009, 5:59 PM

Inquirer staffer Troy Graham reports:

Will “Pooh” Hook surrendered yesterday at Police Headquarters to face burglary and other charges.

Those charges stemmed from what police described as an earlier, failed attempt to rob Rian Thal, a popular party planner gunned down outsider her apartment at the Piazza at Schmidt’s on June 27.

Later that day, three gunmen confronted Thal and her friend, Timothy Gilmore, in the hallway outside her seventh floor apartment in the complex’s Navona building.

The plan, police said, was to push them inside and rob them of drugs and cash. Instead, Gilmore ran and both were gunned down.

Police said Hook, who also went by the names James Wilson and Keith Epps, masterminded that robbery, but he had not been charged in the deaths of Thal, 34, and Gilmore, 40.

Thal had four kilograms of cocaine and more than $100,000 in cash inside her apartment when she was killed
Read more breaking news in our From The Source blog.

Inquirer Online Desk @ 5:59 PM Permalink | 13 comments

13 comments

Comments (13)

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 7:03 PM, 07/14/2009

Stop describing her as a party planner. she was a major drug dealer. Party planning was a way to wash the drug money.

— bluebook1

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 7:10 PM, 07/14/2009

but drugs make the party a little better.

— notch44

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 7:19 PM, 07/14/2009

MURCHISON, THE BUTTONMAN IN THESE PIAZZA MURDERS, IS A STATE PAROLEE! He was released to a Community Correction Center at his minimum (for Armed Robbery) and, of course, walked away. Wilson was also a State Parolee and who else is has yet to be determined! There are literally HUNDREDS of State Parole and Dept. of Corrections escapees at large in Philadelphia as you read this and it is these State Parolees that are responsible for our Murder and Crime Rates! For YEARS NOW, they have been released earily and when they should not have been released at all in order for OPM Rendell to save State Budget monies for "NO BID" and $60 Million+ in other "Inappropriate" Contracts the State Auditor has repeatedly denounced Rendell about. Contracts that went to OPM Rendell's friends, law firm and campaign contributors. The Mayor, City Council and State Legislature were all told in writting, with evidence for 18 months now and they have done nothing! Murder victim after murder victim...destroyed family after destroyed family.... Do any of us think these murderers would think twice about murdering any innocent who got in their way or witnessed their murders? When is the U.S. Dept. of JUSTICE GOING TO SEND "TEFLON ED" A "TARGET LETTER" AND STOP THIS CARNAGE!? Mayor Nutter...how much blood is enough? When are you going to sue the state and get the money back we've had to pay out to make up for Rendell shorting us in State assets and turning loose anaimals like Giddings to prey upon us? (How many million$ alone were spent just to arrest Floyd after SGT Liczbinski was brutally murdered by Cain?) Will the City Council stop counting their "DROP" money, etc. and STOP the Rendell Murders? NO MORE EXCUSES, STUDIES, COMMITTEES, BLAMING GUNS...STOP THE RENDELL MURDERS NOW! The phone number for the U.S. Attorney in Phila. is 215-861-8200. The Presdient's comment line is 1-202-456-1111. Hit the "Email this" button and ask Mike.Levy@usdoj.gov to investigate. How much is enough?

— John Law

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 7:22 PM, 07/14/2009

We have been suckered long enough! When poor SGT. Liczbinski was murdered by Cain, Warner and Floyd...none of whom should have been released...Rendell and Nutter blamed guns (guns can't blame back) and it's sounded like they were really trying to do something...(Shame on them)! When poor SGT. McDonald was murdered by Giddings, Rendell commissioned a B.S. Study...haven't hear anything about that "study" have you? That's because it was only designed to get that media spotlight off "Fast Eddie" and we let him get away with it (Shame on us). And please remember, for every 1 of these Parolee Murders you hear about...there's 100 that don't make the papers, but the victims are still as dead and the poor families are still destroyed. If Murchison (the triggerman in these PIAZZA MURDERS) had stayed in prison, two people would still be alive. There was no honest reason on earth for Giddings, Cain, Floyd, etc. to be released, their records were horrifying...two HEROs died that could have been and deserved to have been saved. Giddings was kicked out of 2 prisons, did over 500 days in the hole, was declared a threat to the security of the prison by Dept. of Corrections. Cain and Warner were repeatedly segregated for stirring up the prison Muslim population and had numerous other prison infractions on top of long, violent criminal records but they were released to save State Budget moneys for No Bid contracts. Rendell, Nutter try and make this carnage look complicated and that they are trying to solve this problem while Rendell contnues to release 2,000 State Prison Inmates per month back into our neighborHOODS. Nutter just gets "Angry". Shame on us for letting them continue to get away with destroying our families and turning Philadelphia, a World Class City, into "Killadelphia" the largest Open Air Prison in America and 1st in the Nation is COP KILLINGS!!! Let's get up off our knees and make some phone calls to Mike Levy at (215) 861-8200 = U.S. Attorney.

— John Law

Comment removed.

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 8:37 PM, 07/14/2009

What's this guy's name? Keith Hook? Will Epps? Anyway, his lwayer said he had nothing to do with it. He was home reading his Bible when the whole thing went down. Really.

— There He Is

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 9:03 PM, 07/14/2009

Stop calling Ms. Thal a party planner. She is what she is -- a person known to authorities as a drug mule/dealer.

— Anne Arkey

Comment removed.

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 9:29 PM, 07/14/2009

i love how everyone keeps referring to her as a "party planner"...i wish her name was leroy, than she would be called what she really was, DRUG TRAFFICKER! its a shame shes dead and my heart goes out to hger family and friends, but she was a drug dealer. how many people get killed everyday by the drugs she sells? all those $5 dollar crack rocks on the corners that make neighborhoods un'livable, were once part of a kilo...people who suppl;y drugs are just as guilty as the corner hoppers who kill eachother everyday...its a vicious circle, but live by the swoard, die by the swoard.

— jesteele

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 10:18 PM, 07/14/2009

She was a common drug dealer. Party planner, whatever! As far as the murderers, these guys are dumb. They made them out to look like calculated "assasins?" They got the first letters right.

— SayHello2MyLittleFriend

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 10:21 PM, 07/14/2009

Willie the Pooh. LOL. Where do they get these nicknames?

— SayHello2MyLittleFriend

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 10:35 PM, 07/14/2009

The guy has three names- sounds like guilty to me. And like some of you have said- the chick was a drug dealer, quit calling her a party planner. The victims and the killers in this case all are bad people.

— dude