What started as a petty theft, police said, became one of the most gruesome Philadelphia killings this year, shocking an up-and-coming neighborhood associated more with glittering condominiums and trendy restaurants than with random violence. Residents started thinking twice about walking home alone, and people donated thousands of dollars to post a reward for the arrest of O'Donnell's killer.
Neighbors also provided police with a list of surveillance cameras in the area, and soon detectives were looking through endless hours of footage from the night O'Donnell died.
Last Thursday, police released footage from several cameras that recorded someone biking in aimless circles up and down Girard as he looked for, in Philadelphia Capt. James Clark's words, "someone to rob." The next day, police said, a tipster called with Johnson's name.
Johnson is known to police in his North Philadelphia neighborhood, and though he fled when two officers saw him late last week, Johnson's mother later persuaded him to surrender.
He turned himself in about 8:30 p.m. Tuesday. Within 10 or 15 minutes, according to police sources, Johnson admitted murdering O'Donnell and provided details and evidence that only her killer would have.
According to the police sources, Johnson said that after killing O'Donnell June 2, he had wiped his face with his white undershirt and thrown it over a nearby fence, where police found it. At home, Johnson stuffed the jeans he had been wearing into a laundry bag, where they remained until he led police to the bag this week, the sources said.
Johnson was charged Wednesday with murder, rape, and robbery.
Clark, of the homicide unit, would not confirm that Johnson had confessed.
"I will say we're 100 percent positive we have the right individual," Clark said.
