Man charged in shooting death of Northeast Philadelphia jeweler

A man who once did time for bank robbery was charged yesterday with the murder of a beloved Lawndale jeweler.

Investigators said Obina Onyiah, 27, was the gun-toting thug who stalked into William Glatz Jewelers on Oct. 21 alongside escaped convict Kevin Turner.

The two announced that they were going to rob the shop, on Rising Sun Avenue and Passmore Street, and then everything went to hell, police said.

Bill Glatz, 67, the second-generation owner of the store, traded gunshots with the would-be robbers, police said. Both Glatz and Turner, who had escaped from the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility on Oct. 12, were killed.

Witnesses said at the time that Turner's accomplice fled in a black getaway car with tinted windows that was driven by someone else. The driver is still on the loose.

It was unclear yesterday how detectives tracked down Onyiah, who reportedly lived in Frankford. Investigators said he had been charged with murder, weapons violations and related offenses.

In 2005, then-U.S. Attorney Chris Christie announced in a news release that Onyiah had been sentenced to 37 months in federal prison for robbing three banks in New Jersey and attempting to rob a fourth.

According to the release, Onyiah admitted that he had handed a note to a teller at a PNC Bank in Sicklerville that read in part: "I have a gun and I will kill you if I have to, give me all the money in the register with all the big bills!!!!"

Police said Turner, 22, and Onyiah spent two days casing Glatz's shop before they tried to rob the place at gunpoint.