I’ve been critical of Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner here. But in the interest of fairness, after I interviewed two prominent critics of the progressive and activist DA, we at Philly Daily offered a Q&A of Krasner in which we allowed him to fully state his views on crime in Philadelphia without our editing or critical commentary.
And although I remain critical of Krasner, in fairness I’d like to also commend his office’s participation in the huge takedown of violent criminal gangs in Philadelphia.
For too long, violent gang members have made life in some of Philadelphia’s neighborhoods a living hell. Like the old Wild West, these gangs face off and fire guns at each other on the streets and often hit innocent bystanders rather than their gangland rivals. (I’ve joked that I’d like to open a school to teach gangbangers how to properly aim and shoot and not turn their guns sideways like they do in the movies).
I’m glad that the city and the federal government worked together to take some of these violent hoodlums off the board.
On February 25th, the District Attorney’s Office announced that their Gun Violence Task Force (GVTF), along with the Philadelphia Police Department’s Shooting Investigations Group (SIG), the Philadelphia FBI’s field office, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the charging of more than a dozen defendants belonging to multiple West, South and Southwest Philadelphia street groups involved in several shootings in their neighborhoods and elsewhere in the city.
“The shooting spree occurred between September 21, 2022, and May 18th, 2024, and resulted in five homicides and 35 total shooting victims, the youngest victim being five years old,” the DA’s office stated. “The 33rd Philadelphia County Investigating Grand Jury (IGJ) has determined that Mark Johnson, Kasim Brown, Salahuddin Carter, Jymir Burbage, Jerwayne Haywood, Anthony Woodson, Ronnie Vincent-Quan, Herman Stigall, Markees Muhammad, Quamere Hall, Stephen Weddington, Hassan Stafford, Hamzah Curry, Paul Beckwith, Nasir Wells, Hasin Muse, and Tatiana Edwards are implicated in the shooting homicides of four victims, the non-fatal shootings of five survivors, and eleven other shooting incidents. Two other individuals are not being named at this time as part of ongoing investigations.”
The DA’s announcement stated that the Investigating Grand Jury also determined that nine of the defendants are connected to the street group known as the “Young Bag Chasers,” or “YBC,” six are associated with the street group “Campers Campers Klapperz,” or “CCK,” and two are connected to the street group “Parkside Killers,” or “PSK.”
The list of charges includes:
“Ballistic evidence was recovered from various crime scenes and analyzed. The analysis was compared to fired cartridge casings (FCCs) to determine whether the FCCs were fired from the same firearm, and what specific firearm that was. Surveillance video of the shooting incidents were also recovered from businesses, residential properties, city cameras as well as police vehicles equipped with video recording equipment.
“The IGJ alleged that Defendants Salahuddin Carter and Jymir Burbage were involved in a double non-fatal shooting on September 22, 2022, where an eight-year-old was struck by a stray bullet while playing on the front steps in the area of 1500 Block of North 13th Street. Officers responded to the scene at approximately 8:50 P.M. where they found the victim with a graze wound to the side of the victim’s head. The victim was taken to Temple Hospital where a second shooting victim with a gunshot wound to the leg arrived shortly thereafter. The second victim had been the passenger in a vehicle when the vehicle was shot on 13th Street. The driver of the vehicle ultimately crashed the car on the way to the hospital.”
The IGJ also alleges that Defendants Stephen Weddington and Jymir Burbage were involved in a homicide of a victim on December 7, 2023. After the homicide, the “Young Bag Chasers,” or “YBC” relentlessly mocked the victim and the victim’s workplace.
“The DAO remains deeply committed to working with all of our partners to secure justice for victims and co-survivors of violent crime,” said District Attorney Larry Krasner. “Our message to other groups who are engaged in violence: we will use every legal tool, resource and enforcement strategy to hold you accountable and seek an appropriately lengthy jail time for the harm you cause to residents of Philadelphia.”
“I’d like to thank ADA Marianne Aguilar, ADA Anna Walters and members of the Philadelphia Police Department’s Shooting Investigation’s Group for their diligent investigation into a sprawling shooting spree that captured and injured the lives of too many in West, Southwest, and South Philadelphia,” said Assistant District Attorney William Fritze, Chief of the DAO’s Gun Violence Task Force. “This work is a testament to the integral use of witness statements and digital evidence processed through the DAO’s GVTF Forensics Lab.”
Captain James Kearney of the Philadelphia Police Department’s Shooting Investigations Groups also weighed in, “The collaboration between the Philadelphia Police Department’s Shooting Investigations Group and the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office’s Gun Violence Task Force allows for successful outcomes like the one today. It’s because of the collaboration with our Law Enforce
