Cops seek bar owner's killers

A popular owner of an Olney bar who was shot and robbed after walking a female patron to her car last week has died.

John Adams, 47, owner of Johnny's Top Cat Club, on 5th Street near Ruscomb, was pronounced dead Monday morning at Albert Einstein Medical Center, police Homicide Lt. Philip Riehl said yesterday.

Police are still searching for the gunman and his accomplice, who stopped Adams on 5th Street near the bar about 10:50 p.m. on May 2 and gunned him down.

Dramatic surveillance video released by police last week showed the gunman raising his pistol at Adams, who was on his way back to the bar.

Dawn Cason, 38, a cousin of Adams, said yesterday: "Somebody knew who these people are. The video clearly shows they were waiting for him once he comes back up the street. . . . It could have been any shop owner on the block. It's just sad that out of the nine years he's been there [as the owner of the club], he's never had any problems. He was good to his patrons. It's just sad."

Cason said that there would be a candlelight vigil for Adams outside the club at 7 tonight.

On the night that Adams was shot, the club was hosting one of its popular comedy shows. The two assailants had gone into the bar, but refused to pay the $20 cover charge for the show, held in the back of the bar. They then left the bar and minutes later Adams was shot.

Anissa Bane, a Philadelphia comedian who uses the stage name "Ms. Darkchild," said that there will be a benefit to raise money for a reward to help find Adams' killers. The event will be from 8:30 to 10:30 p.m. May 19 at the Laff House Comedy Club, 221 South St.

Bane said that many rising stars "would not be where we are today if not for" Adams, who "gave us a place, he gave us hope, he believed in us."

After the gunman and his accomplice left Johnny's, they were seen on a store surveillance video walking and talking with two women on the 5th Street sidewalk.

After the women left, the video shows, the two assailants stopped Adams and held him at gunpoint.

He was shot twice. The gunman went through Adams' pants pocket before fleeing. A close friend of Adams, who did not want her name printed, said last week that she believed that the gunman robbed Adams of cash from the comedy show.

The two assailants were described by police as Hispanic men in their 20s. The gunman, about 5 feet 8, was wearing a light-blue shirt and a Phillies baseball cap, and had tattoos on his neck - lettering on one side, and pictures of money bags on the other, Lt. George McClay, of Northwest Detectives, said last week.

McClay had said that the women who appear in the store surveillance video talking with the two men had been interviewed and told police that they didn't know the men. Riehl said yesterday that homicide detectives will reinterview the women.

The video of the two assailants can be seen at www.phillypolice. com/news. Anyone with information about the men should call the Homicide Division at 215-686-3334.