Supplied photo
Attached is picture. From Left to Right
Sgt. Frank Barclay, P/O Anthony Rosselli, P/O Michael Long, Capt. Frank Palumbo
The 2nd Police District Advisory Council recently honored Anthony Rosselli and Michael Long for an arrest they made after a midsummer street shooting that stemmed from a fight on the 7700 block of Oxford Ave.
Rosselli and Long were named the PDAC’s August 2012 Officers of the Month.
Two men were involved in a series of fights on Aug. 13, said Mark Mroz, the district’s community relations officer. But that wasn’t the end of the trouble, Mroz told PDAC members on Jan. 8 in a meeting at the Philadelphia Protestant Home.
The men who had been fighting and their friends started driving around, searching for each other so they could resume their battle, he said. Men in an Aerostar and a Hyundai were seen following a Suzuki, a Pontiac and a Ford pickup, Mroz said.
At 11:40 p.m., Officers Rosselli and Long began following the Aerostar and Hyundai.
At 1:10 a.m. on Aug. 14, the Aerostar and Hyundai were headed eastbound on St. Vincent Street and stopped near Whitaker Avenue. The other three vehicles approached the intersection heading west and then stopped, said Mroz, who recently became an aide to Inspector Mike Cochrane.
A man got out of the Aerostar and fired four shots from a gun wrapped in a T-shirt, handed the gun back to somebody in the vehicle and then got back in, Mroz said. At that point, all five vehicles drove away from the intersection.
No one was injured.
Using information obtained from Officer Christopher McCue, who had stopped the Hyundai, Long and Rosselli went to the 7800 block of Lorna Drive, found Ian Holland, 19, who they believed was the shooter, and arrested him. He is due to go on trial in December.
After members congratulated the officers, Capt. Frank Palumbo, the 2nd district’s new commander, warned residents that Hondas are popular with car thieves.
“They’re stealing Hondas like crazy,” he said. The cars are worth a lot for their parts, and models from the 1990s are getting stolen, he added.
But it’s not just cars, but what’s in them, that gets swiped, the captain said. Thieves are breaking into vehicles to take iPads, iPods, phones and even spare change, Palumbo said. The captain said it’s amazing how many people leave their GPS devices on their windows.
“That’s making it easy for them,” he said.
The 2nd PDAC will next meet at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 12, at the Philadelphia Protestant Home, 6500 Tabor Ave. ••
Reporter John Loftus can be reached at 215–354–3110 or jloftus@bsmphilly.com
