D.A. still weighing charges in beating death
The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office is still deciding whether to press murder charges in last week's death of Robert Barnes, a homeless man severely beaten in Olney in April.
The Philadelphia District Attorney's Office is still deciding whether to press murder charges in last week's death of Robert Barnes, a homeless man severely beaten in Olney in April.
Barnes was left in a vegetative state after a group of women and juveniles allegedly beat him with a rocking chair leg, a hammer, and their fists. He died Nov. 25 at a hospital in Abington.
Prosecutors had said they would seek murder charges upon Barnes' death, but District Attorney's Office spokesman Cameron Kline said officials were still reviewing the case.
Barnes' death was ruled a homicide by the Montgomery County Medical Examiner's Office this week, but Kline said prosecutors were still "sorting through a very complicated set of medical records and a complicated set of facts."
Barnes, 51, was pumping gas for change at the Sunoco at 5338 N. Fifth St. on April 7 when he argued with a child who was trying to do the same.
The child went home and told his family that Barnes had hit him, police said, prompting his mother, two of her friends, and three juveniles to drive to the gas station and attack Barnes.
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