Philadelphia Daily News
Saturday, Feb. 14, 2003

Worried about Schieber, he called 911

Former neighbor of murder victim testifies

By JIM NOLAN,
nolanj@phillynews.com

Aside from her killer, Parm Greeley may have been the last person to hear Shannon Schieber's final words.

It was 12:45 a.m. on May 7, 1998, and Greeley, then a medical student living across the hall in the same Center City apartment house as Schieber, was home watching the Discovery Channel while his girlfriend slept.

Then he heard what sounded like a scuffle and things falling.

"I heard something like 'Get away from me,' " Greeley testified yesterday in federal court on behalf of Schieber's parents, who filed a $3.8 million civil-rights lawsuit against the city of Philadelphia. They allege that mistakes by police contributed to their daughter's murder by serial rapist Troy Graves.

Greeley did not call 911 at the time. But more than an hour later, he heard another voice calling from outside his apartment, which he also believed had come from Schieber's apartment.

"Somebody, please help me!"

Greeley said he knocked on Schieber's door repeatedly to ask if she was OK, without hearing anything from inside. After a couple of minutes, he called 911 and contacted a neighbor downstairs.

"I heard a scream for help and a choking sound," he testified yesterday, recalling what he had said to the 911 operator when he called around 2 a.m.

But even the renowned medical expert hired by the Schiebers testified that by the time police arrived at the building around 2:12 a.m., Shannon Schieber was not only unconscious - but also possibly brain-dead.

"I think by 2:13 there would have been brain damage," said forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden, whose previous credits include examining the deaths of John Belushi, JFK and Martin Luther King Jr., and testifying on behalf of O.J. Simpson.

Earlier on direct examination from the Schiebers' attorneys, Baden testified that he believed the 23-year-old Wharton student likely was alive when police arrived.

The testimony was designed to add credence to the Schiebers' claim that their daughter might have been saved if cops had broken in the door.

Graves, the serial rapist who was arrested in 2002 and who pleaded guilty in the Schieber murder, had told police in his confession that he heard Greeley's knocks on the door. But he said that he had killed Schieber and left her apartment through a balcony window before cops arrived.

Graves, now serving multiple life prison sentences for rapes in Colorado, refused to testify for the city or the Schiebers in the civil case. Judge Norma Shapiro would not allow the city to use details of his confession in their defense.

Whether Schieber was alive or dead at the time cops arrived is critical to their case. Without proof that she was alive at a time police might have been able to save her, the plaintiff cannot pursue damages against the city for the pain and suffering of her death.

The Schiebers also have argued that the city contributed to their daughter's murder by having a Police Department practice of downgrading sexual attacks to lesser crimes or noncrimes.

They contend that because of downgrading, cops missed evidence that a serial rapist was on the loose in the neighborhood - specifically two previous rapes committed by Graves in 1997.

As a result, they claim that beat cops - from the officer who stopped Graves in September 1997 to the two cops who showed up at Schieber's door that night - might have acted differently.

Attorneys for the city have said that cops acted properly in their handling of the Graves rapes and at Schieber's apartment that night.

They argue that the Schiebers' case is speculation built into circumstance, made possible only when viewed in 20/20 hindsight.