Tears, bewilderment after woman Melissa Thomas killed in gunpoint robbery outside bar 53rd and Market in Philadelphia

Killadelphjia strikes again.  Chicago may get national attention now and then for their murder rate, but the city of Philadelphia is just as bad! 

Philly DotCom reports when the phone rang hours before dawn Sunday, Pamela Campbell, barely awake, ran to her daughter's bedroom and banged on the door so hard that she thought it would fall off its hinges.

But Melissa Thomas didn't answer.

The homicide detective on the other end of the line asked Campbell to describe her daughter. She had a tattoo of her niece's name on her arm, Campbell said, "MOM" splashed across her wrist, a pair of praying hands near her shoulder.

She had short hair, always dyed some wild color, changing from blue to green to red on a whim. She had a sweet voice and sang in her church's choir. She was 29.

"He said, 'I'm sorry,' " Campbell recalled Monday.

"And I couldn't speak anymore."

Thomas was killed early Sunday outside a bar at 53d and Market Streets, just a few blocks from the house she shared with her mother. Police say she and another woman were approached about 2:30 a.m. by two men who robbed them at gunpoint.

And then - with the women's belongings already in hand, police said - one of the men began firing.

Thomas was hit twice in the left side of her chest and was pronounced dead at the scene.

The other woman, whom Thomas' family knows only as "Strawberry," was shot once in her left arm.

"She gave them everything they asked for, and they still killed her," said Thomas' sister, Tanya Mapp.

Thomas' killing comes after two other armed purse-snatchings that left one dead and one injured in as many weeks.

More here

The robbers got what they wanted, but it wasn’t enough, not when they could be identified.