Crash Kills Cop, Badly Injures 2nd

The Philadelphia Police Department is in mourning following a car accident in Mantua last night that claimed the life of one officer and left another critically injured.

The deceased has been identified as Isabel Nazario, a Narcotics Strike Force officer detailed to the 16th Police District in West Philadelphia, police said. Her partner, Terry Tull, was listed in extremely critical condition at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania last night.

About 9 p.m., police began pursuing a white Cadillac Escalade near 46th and Westminster after the car failed to stop when police tried to pull it over, said Lt. Frank Vanore, a police spokesman.

Nazario and Tull learned of the pursuit and decided to join in, he said. As they headed south on 39th Street with Tull at the wheel, the Escalade , being driven by a 16-year-old unlicensed male traveling east on Wallace Street, broadsided their cruiser near the passenger door, police said.

Nazario, 40, a mother with 18 years on the force, was killed instantly.

The driver of the Escalade was treated at Children's Hospital for minor injuries last night, then transported to the Homicide Unit for questioning, the sources said.

Last night, Mayor Nutter, Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey and other police brass rushed to HUP, where they joined hundreds of cops who had raced there as well.

"Tonight we have lost one of Philadelphia's finest," said Nutter. "Our hearts and our prayers go out to her family."

He described Nazario's death as senseless.

Ramsey looked glassy-eyed and visibly shaken, saddened and upset.

"This is the second officer that we've had killed this year. It's a very difficult time. "

Outside the hospital, Highway Patrol officers lined up as cabs carrying visibly shaken family members pulled up to the entrance. Inside, down the hall, a sea of men in women in blue hugged and comforted one another, clearly saddened by the loss, again, of one of their own. *