Wounded U. alum takes stand at trial

John LaBombard joined five other witnesses in testifying against the two alleged Palestra gunmen. and Laura McClure Six witnesses, including 1998 College graduate John La Bombard, testified yesterday in the trial of the two men charged with the shootings outside of the Palestra last March that left one man dead and three others wounded. As the prosecution continued to present its case, Assistant District Attorney Jude Conroy used the second day of the trial to recreate the chaotic scene on the eastern side of Penn's campus that followed a high school basketball game at the Palestra. The defendants, Kyle McLemore and Nathaniel Ortiz, both 21, have been charged with murdering 22-year-old Anthony Davis and injuring three others, including La Bombard, on 33rd Street between Walnut and Chestnut streets. At the end of the day, the defense attorneys said they were not worried by the prosecution's case so far and remained convinced that they would win acquittals. Each of the defendants has his own lawyer in the case. "They haven't even laid a glove on us," said Charles Peruto, McLemore's attorney. "They don't even have a clean witness." La Bombard, who testified for about 10 minutes, told the jury that while he was working on a project inside the Blauhaus, a bullet ripped through the wooden walls and hit his leg. "It was almost like three football players hitting me with a two-by-four," said La Bombard, who now works for an architectural firm in Wyoming. Conroy also called two friends of Davis' who were with him in his green Lexus shortly before the shootings began at approximately 4 p.m. One of them, Damien Miller, said that while he, Davis and two others were in the lobby of the Palestra waiting to get tickets for the Philadelphia Public League's championship basketball game, a group of about 20 men in line in front of them began an argument with Davis that led to a fist fight. Miller identified McLemore as one of the men who took part in the fight and said he later overheard Davis say that the group was from South Philadelphia. Although Miller acknowledged that Davis "had a beef" with the South Philadelphia men, he claimed he did not know what the argument was about. Police kicked both groups out of the stadium after breaking up their fight, but according to Miller, he and his friends then snuck back into the game. Oscar Tucker, one of the other friends in Davis' group, testified that Davis was concerned that the other group was waiting for them outside. After emerging cautiously from the Palestra, the group started to drive away in Davis' Lexus. When they got stuck in traffic in the middle of 33rd Street, Tucker said he saw "two or three men" -- including McLemore and Ortiz. McLemore had "a black object" at his side, Tucker said. Tucker then jumped out of the car and ran west toward 34th and Chestnut streets with Jeffrey Noble, another friend who had met up with Davis during the game. Noble was shot in the back while fleeing, but the others kept running and returned to their homes. Noble, expected to be a star witness for the prosecution, is scheduled to testify tomorrow. Fortunato Perri, Ortiz's lawyer, said yesterday's testimony came up short of the truth. "I think it's pretty clear from [Miller's] testimony that he was lying," Perri said. During cross-examination, the defense tried to prove that Tucker could not have seen a gun at McLemore's side from his vantage point. "The whole issue here is whether or not Kyle McLemore had a gun at the time of the shooting and so far nobody's put a gun to his hand," Peruto said. Latisha Ferebee, who was also wounded, testified that as she was walking on the west side of 33rd Street toward Chestnut Street after the game, she saw Davis' car stop about 10 feet from her, after which Davis jumped out of the drivers' side door. "About a minute or two" later, Ferebee said she heard gunshots and ducked under a chain link fence. She was shot in the elbow as she ran. Philadelphia Police Detective Raleigh Witcher, who supervised the collection of evidence from the scene, and Penn Police Officer Phillip Lyden, who broke up the fight in the lobby of the Palestra, were also called to the stand. Conroy estimated that he would be done calling witnesses for the prosecution by tomorrow morning.