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Suspect in Phila. hammer attack has history of trouble

The man accused of going after a rider on the Broad Street Line last week with a ball-peen hammer, Thomas Scantling, has been in trouble with the law for a long time.

Thomas Scantling
Thomas ScantlingRead more

The man accused of going after a rider on the Broad Street Line last week with a ball-peen hammer, Thomas Scantling, has been in trouble with the law for a long time.

He has served time for robbery and has had other encounters with the law. And he's been having mental-health problems, relatives told police when they identified him as the man who cold-cocked a 20-year-old laboratory assistant on his way home from work about 12:15 a.m. last Thursday.

Scantling, 26, of the 6500 block of Gratz Street in West Oak Lane, was charged in a warrant issued Tuesday night with the assault of Dewayne Taylor inside a northbound train - an event captured by a SEPTA surveillance camera and shown widely on television and the Internet late Monday night and afterward.

Capt. Sharon Seaborough of Central Detectives said Scantling was arrested late Tuesday night at an undisclosed mental-health facility in the city where he had been placed by his family. He cooperated with authorities at the time of his arrest late Tuesday night, but he did not make a statement, she said.

Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey said yesterday that Scantling might have gotten away with the attack if not for the cameras.

Nearly all the people on the train who witnessed the five-minute beating have disappeared. The graphic recording shows 10 to 12 bystanders doing nothing to stop the attack, which prompted the commissioner to strongly condemn those who wouldn't step in.

"Sometimes you have to put yourself in harm's way to help," Ramsey said, pointing out that some large, muscular men were on the train at the time.

"I just think in a situation like that when there wasn't a knife or a gun, you would hope that someone would help the man out. . . . It's sad," Ramsey said. "If they were the ones being beaten, I would think they would want someone to step up."

The commissioner paused in his statements and clarified that one man did step in - the one who stole the victim's cell phone. That person was seen on the surveillance video slipping the phone in his pocket before a disoriented Taylor got back on the train.

Police said yesterday they were looking for that person, who faces theft charges. If necessary, they said, they will release the video with his image.

That's how they found Scantling.

Shortly after the video was telecast late Monday night, police began getting tips, including information from relatives who recognized Scantling and his son, Maurice, on it.

Police said relatives told them that Scantling has a history of mental illness and had checked into a mental-health facility.

His family told authorities that on the night of the attack, Scantling told them he heard voices.

Scantling's mother, Toni Frazier, 51, said last night from her West Oak Lane home that her son's mental health had begun to deteriorate a year ago after a series of deaths - a total of nine - in his extended family.

Five months ago, and again four weeks ago, she said, she had him committed to a mental-health facility for treatment of paranoid schizophrenia. But he refused to take the prescribed medicine, saying doctors were trying to poison him, and was then released because of problems with health insurance.

She said that lately her son had been carrying the hammer in his backpack because he thought some people were after him.

"He said there were people in his shoes, the house was bugged," Frazier said. "I didn't raise him to be like that. I was scared to death for him. I was scared to death for others. I could not reach him."

Frazier said when her son came home last Thursday night, he told her only that "the guy on the subway was after him, wanted to kill him, and that he had a tear-drop tattoo on his face."

Scantling never mentioned the attack.

"Thank God this guy was able to be treated and released, that my son did not kill him," Frazier said. "I am so sorry this happened."

Seaborough said Scantling had been evaluated medically and cleared by doctors to be released to police. The suspect also will be evaluated by prison doctors and court experts, officials said.

Meanwhile, Scantling remained in custody after failing to post $1 million bail.

According to court records, Scantling was to appear in court today for a hearing stemming from a drug arrest in May. The trial is now postponed, pending a psychiatric evaluation, said Cathie Abookire, a spokeswoman for the District Attorney's Office.

The drug arrest came just four months after he completed three years' probation after pleading guilty in 2003 to selling marijuana, court records indicate. At the time, police alleged he had a small amount of crack cocaine and marijuana. While on probation, he was required to submit to random drug testing and to maintain his job as a laborer.

Scantling's only violent criminal conviction, according to court records, was for robbery when he was a juvenile. He was sent to the Glen Mills Schools, a facility for delinquent teenage boys in Delaware County.

The two other times he was arrested on violent offenses, charges were withdrawn.

On Christmas 2002, Scantling was charged with the rape of a 15-year-old girl in his West Oak Lane home.

According to court records, Scantling admitted he had intercourse with the girl, but maintained it was consensual and he did not know she was only 15.

The charges were dropped by the District Attorney's Office after a Jan. 27, 2003, preliminary hearing. It was unclear why yesterday.

In January 2005, Scantling was arrested again, after a domestic dispute months earlier in West Philadelphia. According to court records, Scantling pushed his ex-girlfriend to the floor, pointed a .357 Magnum at her, and said, "I should pop you."

Prosecution was withdrawn after the woman refused to testify against him, records show.

The surveillance recording that led to Scantling's arrest is dramatic.

The video shows both Taylor and Scantling, with his 6-year-old son, boarded the train at City Hall. Scantling kissed his son on the cheek and led him to an open seat.

Taylor took a seat near the door. In an interview, he said he was relaxing listening to his iPod.

Then Scantling retrieved a ball-peen hammer from a backpack and began beating Taylor as the train approached Fairmount Station.

With Taylor trying to block the blows, Scantling kept swinging, forcing Taylor off the train when the door opened. The assault continued on the platform.

The boy got off and watched the attack before he left with his father.

Taylor got back on the train, got off at Allegheny Station, and walked to Temple University Hospital, where he received stitches and was treated for non-life-threatening head, neck and hand injuries, police said.

The Department of Human Services is investigating to assure that Scantling's son is receiving proper care, said DHS spokeswoman Alicia Taylor.

Scantling's mother said DHS went to the family home yesterday and took Maurice with them. She and Scantling shared custody of the boy in the absence of his mother. Frazier said she hoped the boy could be placed with Scantling's sister, Kimberly Frazier.