Harrison's bar searched in shooting probe

Investigators hunting for the man who shot and critically wounded Dwight Dixon on July 21 have served a search warrant at Playmakers, the Fairmount bar owned by NFL star Marvin Harrison, the Daily News has learned.

Dixon was riddled with seven bullets while he sat inside a Toyota Camry on Girard Avenue near 28th Street, just two blocks north of Harrison's bar, police said.

Dixon, 33, who last year claimed that Harrison shot him in the hand following a fistfight - told an officer at the scene of the July 21 shooting that he believed the shooter had been hired by Harrison.

A law-enforcement source said that detectives, who executed the warrant on Saturday, wanted to review the bar's surveillance footage to see if the gunman - a 6-foot-tall black man who wore a dark hooded jacket, jeans and white sneakers - was inside Playmakers before the shooting.

Investigators are waiting for the footage to be made available, the source said.

Police haven't spoken with Harrison, the former Indianapolis Colts wide receiver, nor have they found any evidence that he was involved in the July 21 shooting, the source added.

Jerome Brown, the attorney who represented Harrison during last year's investigation, declined to comment yesterday to the Daily News.

Detectives still haven't spoken to Dixon, who remains unconscious in an intensive-care unit at Hahnemann University Hospital.

Doctors at Hahnemann spent 10 hours operating on Dixon when he arrived last week with wounds to his chest, stomach and arm.

Surveillance footage filmed by cameras affixed to the front of a Valu-Plus on Girard Avenue showed the gunman shoot repeatedly at Dixon, who was sitting in the driver's seat of a rental car.

Police last week released images of the triggerman fleeing on foot with his head lowered, making it impossible for his face to be viewed clearly.

Last year, Dixon sparked national interest when he claimed Harrison had chased and shot at him after they exchanged blows on Thompson Street near 25th on April 29, 2008.

The shooting occurred two weeks after the two had a dispute at Playmakers.

Another man, Robert Nixon, 33, claimed that he was shot in the back by Harrison as he tried to run from the scene.

Although police found that five bullets had been fired by a handgun Harrison owned, District Attorney Lynne Abraham declined to press charges against Harrison.

Abraham said Dixon, Nixon and others provided investigators with nine accounts of the shooting.

Dixon filed a civil lawsuit against Harrison last fall, seeking more than $100,000 in damages.

Nixon filed a civil suit against Harrison last Friday. His attorney, Wadud Ahmad, told the Daily News last week that Nixon still experiences discomfort from the bullet lodged in his back.