2 charged in carjacking, looting pharmacy in West Philadelphia
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Two more people have been arrested and charged in connection with looting incidents in West Philadelphia last month, District Attorney Larry Krasner's office announced Thursday.
Twenty-one-year-old Samir Brown and 22-year-old Nassir Boyd face various charges, including conspiracy, burglary, receiving stolen property, and more.
Officials said Brown and Boyd were linked to a violent street group that was operating in the 18th Police District south of Market Street. Both are currently in custody and there is over $1 million in bail that the DAO requested.
RELATED: Stores looted in Center City, North Philadelphia and Northeast Philadelphia
During the looting incidents, officials said Brown and three other suspects carjacked two people in a rented Dodge Durango at gunpoint on Sept. 24. They said one of the suspects repeatedly kicked one of the victims as they were on the ground.
Three days later on Sept. 27, officials said Brown and a group of people took the stolen Durango to the Olive Tree Pharmacy in West Philadelphia and stole thousands of oxycodone and Percocet pills. Before the burglary, officials said Boyd knocked out surveillance cameras.
As part of an investigation with law enforcement, the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General's Bureau of Narcotics Investigation and Drug Control arrested Brown two weeks later. During a search of his home and car, officials found a prohibited gun, crack cocaine, oxycodone and other opiates, marijuana, and packaging material.
Watch the full press conference below.
"I'm grateful to the excellent investigative work conducted by agents with the Pa. Office of the Attorney General and the Philadelphia Police Department," Assistant District Attorney Jeffrey Palmer, Assistant Supervisor of the DAO's Gun Violence Task Force, said. "These arrests should send a signal to those opportunistic few who chose to damage their communities and who pose a threat to public safety: We know who you are and you will be held accountable for your actions."
In September, looters also struck multiple businesses across Center City, Mayfair and North Philadelphia after a Philadelphia judge dismissed all criminal charges against former Philadelphia police officer Mark Dial in the shooting death of Eddie Irizarry in Kensington.
Dial was charged after surveillance and body camera videos contradicted the initial police account of Irizarry's death in Kensington. The District Attorney's Office has since refiled the charges.
Police previously confirmed to CBS News Philadelphia that the looting had no connection to earlier demonstrations over the dismissal of charges in the death of Eddie Irizarry. Interim Police Commissioner John Stanford blamed "criminal opportunists."
Irizarry's family has said they do not want anyone damaging property in their son's name. In a Sept. 8 news conference, officials released footage from Dial and his partner's body cameras showing the shooting - and District Attorney Larry Krasner made that point.
"The family repeatedly said to me, and the family's counsel repeatedly said to me, that they do not want any criminal unrest, they do not want any rioting, they do not want any looting, they do not want anyone to claim that what this video depicts or the nature of the case or the event itself justifies any criminal behavior," Krasner said. "That that would be a violation of their respect, their love and their reverence for young Eddie Irizarry."
