Piazza

The Mets might finally have found the way to solve the Phillies riddle. Play Mike Piazza. The catcher, who almost pulled New York into the W column with a pinch-hit RBI single Thursday night, single-handedly made sure his team didn't fall victim to the Philly Phlu again. He launched two home runs - one to leftfield, one to right - to help the Mets to a 9-6 win last night at Veterans Stadium. It is only the fourth time New York has beaten the Phillies this season. "You're reading all the time about the troubles he's having," manager Terry Francona said.

Philadelphia prosecutors finished their case Wednesday in the 2009 double slaying at the Piazza at Schmidts complex with a medical examiner's testimony that victim Rian Thal was killed by a gunshot wound to the head - with the gun barrel in contact with her scalp. The testimony of Gary Collins, the city's acting chief deputy medical examiner, painted a portrait of Thal, 34, not as the accidental shooting victim of a botched robbery but as someone who was executed. With the completion of the case by Assistant District Attorneys Carlos Vega and Jennifer Selber, the trial resumes Monday with what could be a very brief defense on behalf of the three defendants.

A COMMON PLEAS Court judge yesterday ordered the jury in the prosecution of three men in the 2009 double murder at the Piazza at Schmidts to ignore the testimony of a key prosecution witness - "as if it never happened," the judge said - after the witness refused to answer questions from a defense attorney. Called to the stand for more than two hours on Friday, admitted shooter Donnell Murchison immediately stated, "I do not wish to testify," then gave one-word answers to some details of the crime under questioning by the prosecution.

Monday's sentencing of Katoya Jones for her role in the 2009 Piazza at Schmidts double murder was postponed to Jan. 19 to give lawyers more time to prepare. Jones, 27, was to have been sentenced by Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Benjamin Lerner on her guilty plea to two counts of third-degree murder in the June 27, 2009, slayings of Rian Thal and Timothy Gilmore at the new, upscale complex in Northern Liberties. Jones, a pharmaceutical-manufacturing worker, admitted letting the shooters into the security-coded Navona building, where she lived five floors below Thal's unit.

This morning's scheduled sentencing of Katoya Jones - who pleaded guilty to participating in the 2009 Piazza at Schmidts double murder - was postponed to Jan. 19 to give lawyers more time to prepare. Jones, 27, was to have been sentenced by Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Benjamin Lerner on her guilty plea to two counts of third-degree murder in the June 27, 2009 slayings of event-planner Rian Thal and friend Timothy Gilmore at the new Piazza at Schmidts complex in Northern Liberties.

The eighth and final defendant arrested in a 2009 double slaying at the Piazza at Schmidts was ordered held for trial Tuesday. After a preliminary hearing at the Criminal Justice Center, Municipal Judge Patrick Dugan ordered Caesar Holloway, 35, to stand trial on two counts of murder, robbery, conspiracy, and related crimes. Holloway is among those accused in the June 2009 slayings of Rian Thal, 34, and Timothy Gilmore, 40, in the hallway outside Thal's apartment at the Northern Liberties complex.

The trial date for those charged in last summer's double murder at the Piazza in Northern Liberties has been set for November 2011. Attorneys on both sides attempted to schedule a trial for a sooner date, but the multiple defendants and lawyers involved with the case meant conflicts were unavoidable. Eight people have been arrested in connection with the June 26, 2009 killings of Rian Thal and Timothy Gilmore, including a man accused of masterminding the murder plot and a woman who is expected to plead guilty to helping the gunmen stake out the victims.

The trial for those charged in last summer's double homicide at the Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties has been set for November 2011. Attorneys on both sides tried to schedule an earlier date, but the many defendants and lawyers involved meant conflicts were unavoidable. The date was set Thursday morning. Eight people have been arrested in connection with the June 26, 2009, slaying of Rian Thal and Timothy Gilmore, including the man accused of masterminding the killings and a woman who is expected to plead guilty to helping the gunmen stake out the victims.

TWO FORMER confidants of the man on trial for allegedly masterminding the June 2009 double murder/robbery at Piazza at Schmidts testified yesterday about how they became involved in the crimes that cost them their freedom. Katoya Jones, 27, a former pharmaceutical-company employee who lived at the Piazza in Northern Liberties, and Langdon Scott, 28, a North Philadelphia crack dealer with a rap sheet, also placed the alleged ringleader, Will Hook, 43, a/k/a Keith Epps, at the center of the plot.

A man who admitted being peripherally involved in the drug-theft conspiracy that ended with the June 27, 2009, slayings of two people at the Piazza at Schmidts complex in Northern Liberties was sentenced Friday to six to 12 years in prison by a Philadelphia judge. Robert Keith, 30, pleaded guilty in November to conspiracy, burglary, and possession an instrument of crime involving a break-in at a sixth-floor apartment at the Piazza's Navona building that he thought held a cache of drugs and cash.

A Philadelphia judge on Wednesday set May 29, 2013, as the date for the felony murder trial of Caesar Holloway, the last person charged in the 2009 drug-related killings of two people at the Piazza at Schmidts development in Northern Liberties. The new trial date by Common Pleas Court Judge Jeffrey P. Minehart was set one day after Holloway, 35, rejected a final guilty-plea proposal after two months of talks between defense attorney Donald Chisholm II and Assistant District Attorney Carlos Vega.

After two months of weighing his options, Caesar Holloway has rejected a guilty-plea deal from the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office and will be tried for his alleged role in the 2009 drug-related killings of two people at the Piazza at Schmidts development in Northern Liberties. On Tuesday, Assistant District Attorney Carlos Vega and defense attorney Donald Chisholm II confirmed that Holloway, 35, rejected the plea offer. The two lawyers and Common Pleas Court Judge Jeffrey P. Minehart are to decide on a trial date Wednesday.

THE TRIAL for the eighth and final defendant in the Piazza at Schmidts double-murder case was delayed yesterday because he is considering whether to accept a plea deal, according to his attorneys. Caesar Holloway, 35, is charged with two counts of murder and related crimes in the June 27, 2009, slayings of drug dealers Rian Thal, 34, and Timothy Gilmore, 40, who were gunned down in the hallway of Thal's upscale Northern Liberties apartment building. Though not one of the three gunmen, Holloway is accused of helping to plot and plan the drug robbery that turned deadly.

The trial for the eighth and final defendant in the Piazza at Schmidts double-murder case has been delayed because he is mulling over accepting a plea deal, according to the trial's attorneys. Caesar Holloway, 35, is charged with two counts of murder and related crimes for the June 27, 2009, slayings of drug dealers Rian Thal, 34, and Timothy Gilmore, 40, who were gunned down in the hallway of Thal's upscale Northern Liberties apartment building. Though not one of the three gunmen, Holloway is accused of helping to plot and plan the drug robbery that turned deadly.

Thursday's planned sentencing of Katoya Jones, who admitted letting the killers of two people at the Piazza at Schmidts complex in Northern Liberties into the secured building, was postponed until March 7 and may not happen until after she testifies at one more trial. Jones, 29, pleaded guilty in 2010 to two counts of third-degree murder in the 2009 drug robbery-turned murder of party planner Rian Thal, 34, and friend Timothy Gilmore, 40. Jones lived in the Piazza's Navona building several floors below Thal's unit.

It was just before 6 p.m. and still daylight on June 27, 2009, when police descended on the Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties. The newly opened apartment and shopping complex was teeming with people enjoying cocktails at the courtyard restaurants. Upstairs, on the top floor of the seven-story Navona building on North Hancock Street, residents had just discovered the bodies of a man and a woman, riddled with bullets, in the hallway. Initially, police were unsure what the victims - 34-year-old Rian Thal, a party promoter well-known in the city's nightclub scene, and Timothy Gilmore, a 41-year-old long-haul trucker from Ohio - had to do with each other.

Monday's sentencing of Katoya Jones for her role in the 2009 Piazza at Schmidts double murder was postponed to Jan. 19 to give lawyers more time to prepare. Jones, 27, was to have been sentenced by Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Benjamin Lerner on her guilty plea to two counts of third-degree murder in the June 27, 2009, slayings of Rian Thal and Timothy Gilmore at the new, upscale complex in Northern Liberties. Jones, a pharmaceutical-manufacturing worker, admitted letting the shooters into the security-coded Navona building, where she lived five floors below Thal's unit.

This morning's scheduled sentencing of Katoya Jones - who pleaded guilty to participating in the 2009 Piazza at Schmidts double murder - was postponed to Jan. 19 to give lawyers more time to prepare. Jones, 27, was to have been sentenced by Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Benjamin Lerner on her guilty plea to two counts of third-degree murder in the June 27, 2009 slayings of event-planner Rian Thal and friend Timothy Gilmore at the new Piazza at Schmidts complex in Northern Liberties.

The trial in the 2009 slayings at the Piazza at Schmidts - a crime that cast a pall on the bright, new complex at an old Northern Liberties brewery site - ended Thursday with murder convictions and life terms for three men. The Philadelphia Common Pleas Court jury of seven women and five men had deliberated 10 hours since Wednesday before returning verdicts against Will "Pooh" Hook, Edward Daniels, and Antonio Wright in the June 27, 2009, shootings...