Motive Still Unclear In Strawberry Mansion Murder
By Jim Melwert
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Philadelphia police continue to investigate a home invasion in the Strawberry Mansion section of the city that killed a father of two and critically wounded his wife.
Police commissioner Charles Ramsey says investigators still can't figure out a motive for the murders in a home on Cecil B. Moore Avenue near 33rd Street, early yesterday morning.
"We don't know if there was any relationship at all between the victims and the killers. We don't believe there was," Ramsey told KYW Newsradio this morning.
One theory is the killers had the wrong address.
Whatever the motive, 35-year-old John Paul was shot and killed and his 39-year-old wife Sherrell was shot and critically wounded (see previous story and video). Her condition has improved, and Ramsey says detectives are hopeful they can interview her today.
The commissioner also say his thoughts are with the two children who were in the home at the time and had to step over their father's dead body to leave the house.
"It's traumatic," Ramsey says. "You never recover from something like that. There's no way you can recover from something like that."
Ramsey hopes the city's standard $20,000 reward helps the investigation. Investigators say one of the gunmen was wounded, and they say a dark-colored getaway car was seen out front.
