Prosecutor: Lewis should get death penalty

After two days of testimony against the man accused of killing a Philadelphia police officer, Assistant District Attorney Edward Cameron reiterated his department's call for the death penalty.

Speaking outside the Criminal Justice Center after the preliminary hearing for John "Jordan" Lewis concluded, the prosecutor said, "We're going to request the notice to seek the death penalty."

Defense lawyer Michael Coard questioned whether a sufficient case was made. "Is this a first-degree murder? We don't know," he said. ". . . This might not be the first-degree murder that everyone thought it was."

Cameron contended that the case in the slaying of Officer Chuck Cassidy had been made for premeditation. "That's all the law requires, that you form a thought," he said. "He pointed a gun at a Philadelphia police officer and shot him in the head. . . . It's first-degree murder."

He went on to say, "We can't ultimately say anything about a plea deal at this point."

On that point, Coard said, "All options are open."

For two days, witnesses went to the stand in a packed courtroom to implicate Lewis in a series of robberies that culminated in the shooting of Cassidy on Oct. 31. Cassidy died the following day.

The most damaging testimony came today. Two men who knew Lewis well said he had confessed. Three other witnesses identified Lewis as the gun-wielding robber in the West Oak Lane Dunkin' Donuts the day Cassidy was shot.

Lewis, 21, will be formally arraigned on Jan. 31, Municipal Court Judge Francis J. Cosgrove said as he ended the preliminary hearing shortly before 1 p.m. That proceeding will determine the charges on which Lewis can be tried.

Hakim Glover told the court that he advised his cousin to "go down South" when Lewis told him he was "going to kill another cop."

"He was a little bit hysterical," Glover said. "He wasn't in his right mind."

Herbert Hill, a corrections officer who works with Lewis' mother, followed Glover to the stand. Hill spoke about a conversation at the mother's house on Roosevelt Boulevard.

According to Hill, "The defendant said, 'I shot the cop.' "

Hill said he replied, "If you did that, you know you've got to turn yourself in."

Lewis refused, saying, "If the police come and get me it's going to be a mess," Hill recounted.

At this point, Hill was interested only in getting out of the house, he said. So he slipped out, drove a short distance, and called 911.

Glover pleaded guilty on Monday to charges of hindering apprehension and obstruction of justice for driving Lewis to a Wilmington bus station Nov. 3 and buying him a ticket to Florida.

"I was trying to help my family member out," he explained on the stand today.

He also said he demanded that Lewis leave behind two semiautomatics that he had been carrying in his waistband.

"I didn't want him to do anything else," Glover said.

When pressed by defense lawyer Michael Coard, Glover said he was testifying " 'cause I'm not trying to go to jail for something that happened while I was lying in my bed."

Earlier this morning, the court heard from two employees of the West Oak Lane Dunkin' Donuts and a customer who took the stand and identified Lewis as the robber who came into the shop last Halloween and waved a gun at them moments before the officer was shot.

On that "horrible day," as Linda Chan called it, she was standing behind the Dunkin' Donuts counter early that morning opposite a man in a hoodie waving a gun.

Then the bell on the shop door chimed, she testified. The man with the gun swung around, and fired at a police officer slightly crouched at the door.

"If I were a robber," Chan said, "I would do that, too, because I don't want anybody behind me."

Chan testified that after the robber swung around, she heard a gunshot. "I saw the officer fall down," she said.

At that point in Chan's testimony, several people in the courtroom wept softly, dabbing their eyes and noses. Many Cassidy supporters wore small dark blue ribbons pinned to their sweaters and lapels. There were about 130 people crowded into the courtroom, including Cassidy's widow, Judith.

Chan identified Lewis as the robber on Oct. 31 and testified that he had also robbed the store Sept. 18 and had even stopped in two or three weeks after the first robbery to simply buy food. He bought an egg, sausage and cheese sandwich and a medium coffee.

"After he left, we said 'that this is the guy,' " she said of Lewis' second visit to the shop.

Yesterday, nine witnesses testified about five robberies that preceded the sixth, and fatal, holdup. All but one witness firmly identified Lewis as the man who had committed the stickups, and said that he had had a gun.

The testimony, most of it from employees at Dunkin' Donuts shops or at pizzerias, together suggested an increasingly violent path, which began Sept. 18 and ended in Cassidy's death six weeks later at the doughnut shop at 6620 N. Broad St. in West Oak Lane.

When the hearing opened yesterday morning, about 120 people filled the benches, lined the walls, and stood in the aisles. The Cassidy family filled the front rows on one side; Lewis' supporters, the front rows across the aisle.

Uniformed officers made up more than half the crowd, which spilled into the hallway. The city's new police commissioner, Charles H. Ramsey, stopped before the proceeding to speak to Judith Cassidy and several other family members.

Coard persistently labored to shake witnesses' confidence in their identification of Lewis. He also worked to clarify whether the robber had pointed a gun at them or harmed them, or taken any of their personal possessions.

The lawyer, noting that his client faced a multitude of charges, said during a break that "we don't know what the judge is going to hold him on."