A North Philadelphia man accused of killing a Frankford man in a notorious neighborhood bar in early 2011 pleaded guilty Monday and was immediately sentenced to 18 to 40 years in prison.
Tyrese Ford entered the negotiated plea, according to court records. Common Pleas Court Judge Glenn B. Johnson handed down the sentence.
Ford, now 21, was 19 when he fatally shot 20-year-old Chris Spence inside the T&T Bar at Margaret and Hawthorne streets on Feb. 19, 2011.
Spence, who had played football for the Frankford Chargers and Frankford High School, was shot in the chest. He was first taken by car to Aria Health’s Frankford campus and then transferred to the hospital’s Torresdale campus, where he died at 3:11 a.m. Feb. 19, 2011. Prosecutors said the shooting was the result of a fight over a girl.
At a neighborhood meeting held two days before Spence’s murder, residents complained about what they said were fights, drugs and noise at the The T&T bar.
The shooting inside the bar spurred demands that the bar never reopen and then daily protest demonstrations erupted when it did just weeks later.
The bar’s operator, Shamus Armsted, later was found guilty in connection with a shooting in which two demonstrators were wounded across the street from the bar a month after Spence’s death. Armsted was sentenced to seven to 20 years imprisonment in November.
The bar has remained closed and its liquor license was voided. ••
