The Herald, Sharon, Pa.

Local News

October 29, 2009

Ex-Georgia man charged in killing

Detroit man was shot, robbed in ’08

By Tom Davidson

FARRELL — A 20-year-old Shenango Valley man who came to the area from the Atlanta suburbs and has been busted with crack cocaine and marijuana is facing homicide, burglary and conspiracy charges stemming from the Dec. 20, 2008, shooting death and robbery of a Detroit-area man on Farrell’s main drag.

Troy Lamont Coleman, 38, of Detroit, was robbed, shot and killed in the 1200 block of Roemer Boulevard, after a night spent drinking at bars in Farrell. Cash was taken from Coleman but a 61-gram “cookie” of crack cocaine was found in his inside coat pocket during the autopsy.

He was shot at close range with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun, police said.

Southwest Mercer County Regional police detectives have spent much of the past year working the case and Thursday charged Phillip Carnell Phifer, 20, whose last known address was on Mesabi Street in Sharon and who came to the area from Union City, Ga., near Atlanta.

Phifer was already in Mercer County Jail on an unrelated parole violation when Southwest authorities transported him to District Judge Ronald E. Antos, Farrell, to formally arraign him on charges of criminal homicide and burglary and conspiracy to commit both crimes.

It wasn’t the first time Phifer, who goes by “Dred” on the street, claimed he had “murked” — slang for murdered — someone, police said.

Four unidentified witnesses helped police crack the case.

Three male co-conspirators who haven’t been identified or charged were at a house in the 1000 block of Hamilton Avenue when a female co-conspirator called and told them that a dude was passed out in a vehicle on Roemer Boulevard.

They wanted to rob Coleman, but needed a gun for protection. The drove by the car Coleman was passed out in, then saw Phifer walking in the 1000 block of Wallis Avenue. He told them he had a gun.

They went back to where Coleman was parked and rifled through his pockets. At some point Coleman came to and police allege Phifer shot him, firing twice initially then another six or seven shots, according to a cooperative witness.

Phifer told people in Farrell he had shot a man in Atlanta over a woman before he came here.

Dred also told people he shot Coleman, police said.

The case was the result of “good legwork by several officers,” Southwest Chief Riley Smoot said.

Detectives “diligently didn’t give up on (the case) on behalf of the victim and the victim’s family, Smoot said.

Police initially had different suspects in the case, but Quentin Darrell Mathews and Michael William “M.J.” Golden were eliminated as suspects.

Police matched DNA results from a water bottle Pfifer drank from during an unrelated interrogation to a cigarette butt found at the shooting scene, according to the probable cause affidavit filed in the case.

“Investigators did an outstanding job to bring the case to this point,” Smoot said.

More people will be charged in the case, he said.

Phifer is being held in Mercer County Jail.

People facing homicide charges are not allowed bail in the commonwealth.

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