Trio accused of brawl-killing head for trial

Three men charged last month in the beating death of a man outside Citizens Bank Park sat grim-faced during their preliminary hearing yesterday as a parade of witnesses - including a drinking buddy - identified them as the attackers.

After more than six hours of testimony, Municipal Judge Thomas Nocella held the trio for trial, each on murder and conspiracy charges. Their arraignment was set for Aug. 26.

In the meantime, Francis Kirchner, 28; Charles Bowers, 35, and James Groves, 45, remain in jail without bail. David Sale Jr., the 22-year-old Lansdale man they are accused of beating and kicking to death, was buried Monday.

Sale and three friends who were attending a bachelor party at McFadden's restaurant, which is part of the ballpark complex in South Philadelphia, began fighting with the defendants' group, about 30 people with ties to Moe's Tavern in Fishtown.

Security threw them out, but the factions brawled again in the parking lot, where the defendants pummeled Sale to death, police said.

Assistant Medical Examiner Chase Blanchard, who performed the autopsy, said Sale died of multiple blunt-force injures that caused his brain to swell and bleed.

His spine and bowels also hemorrhaged, his left ear was nearly ripped off, and lacerations were found in his spleen, liver and left kidney, among other injuries.

Sale's hands had no defensive wounds, she said.

Nocella said he took that to mean that Sale had not been fighting back.

"There was no damage to his hands because if he gave them any resistance, it was very minor," Nocella told the near-capacity audience, which included Sale's tearful mother. "But for the most part during this encounter, he was the victim."

Attorneys for each defendant said that their client had not landed the fatal blows during the July 25 incident, and thus should not be charged with murder.

Each attorney said that some witnesses told police details that differed from what they testified to yesterday. Some witnesses, for instance, were fuzzy regarding the defendants' clothing and hair color, and about who had kicked Sale as opposed to punched him.

Groves' attorney, Scott Di Claudio, said he planned to file a motion to quash the charges against his client before the arraignment.

"At most, he threw two punches to someone's mid-section and attempted to walk way," Di Claudio said of Groves.

Brian McMonagle, Bowers' attorney, seized on testimony from Sale's best friend, Daniel Curran, that Bowers was fighting with Curran while Sale was being attacked.

"You can't be in two places at once," he said. "It was a melee and somebody beat and horribly kicked this victim. It just wasn't Charlie Bowers."

Assistant District Attorney Richard Sax, however, said the witnesses in the defendants' group, the victim's group and strangers identified the three defendants as Sale's attackers.

"This was a vicious and sustained attack; there's just no other way to describe it: kicking, punching, stomping," Sax said after the hearing. "And, after he was down and crawling on all fours and gasping for his last breath, the beating continued."

Jason Johnson, who said he was Groves' best friend, testified that he had pulled Bowers' off of Sale in the parking lot. Johnson, a Moe's regular, said he was afraid to testify because he had been threatened in the neighborhood.

Gary Wenrich, who was in the parking lot and did not know Sale or the defendants, said he saw Groves and Bowers attacking Sale, but couldn't identify Kirchner.

Several other witness, including Andrew Le, also a stranger to the two groups, said Kirchner had kicked Sale in the head.

"It was like a punt or a soccer kick, because he was already still," Le said.