Rosie Revealed

By: La Tasha C. Williams

Identified in the Giovanni Reid Story as “Rosie”, my real name is La Tasha (and I will be referred to throughout as Williams as to distinguish me from my mother). The Giovanni Reid story ended with me at the doorstep of a major figure in this case – Ms. Lorraine King Hill. My research into Commonwealth witness Lorraine King Hill’s background confirmed that prior to 1991 (the year of the murder) and up until recent years, that she had lived in different homeless shelters.

My wanting to delve into Ms. Hill’s personal history was based on the assumption that she might have been the lady who the three males (Mackey, King, & Dajuan Bennett) standing at Seventeenth and Bainbridge Streets were referring to when they mentioned having seen a “bag lady” at a pay phone booth. Within a matter of weeks, I was able to hone in on Ms. Hill’s current address. I then positioned myself to where we might possibly come to meet, and bingo, an unsuspecting Ms. Hill would end up initiating contact with me!

I developed a cordial relationship with the shoot-from-the-hip, fifty (ish)-year-old woman who I came to call “Miss Lorraine.” During the time we palled around, the approximately five feet, five-inch chubby woman with the round face was attending the Community College of Philadelphia.

In addition to being a student, Miss Lorraine was also a volunteer for a neighborhood program. She graduated with an associate’s degree in a social science field on Mother’s Day 2005.

I liked Miss Lorraine; and as a matter of fact, I still do. Maybe her moral conscience will eventually move her to do the right thing by telling the truth, which was that she did not witness the crime but was in the vicinity when it took place. It is past time for Reid and Bennett’s nineteen year old nightmare to end.

The following is what Hill unwittingly shared with me about her past:

• That she was not a nurse at the time of the shooting or trial, but instead a nursing assistant working in a convalescent home. (I learned from one of Hill’s blood relatives that back in 1991 on the occasions when he drove her to work, that he had observed her dressed in what he recalled was either a blue or green uniform, and NOT a white nurse’s uniform.)

I also learned out of her own mouth:

• that she was a former member of a Philadelphia gang known as the “Morroccos;” and that,
• she used to make guns for the gang and still remembers how to make them; and that,
• she was a former drug user; and that,
• she was a also former drug dealer.

Miss Lorraine told me about an incident that she alleges took place back in 1993, the day before the Reid/Bennett trial was to commence. Paraphrasing, she says that two police detectives came inside a store where she was and badgered her into coming with them – all the while ignoring her protests of not wanting to go. According to Ms. Hill, they told her that they wanted her to stay in a hotel room that they had already booked for her to ensure her appearance in court the following day.

Ms. Hill says that she told the detectives that she did not want to testify but ended up going to the hotel room with them anyway, where she says she remained until the time of trial.

Listening to her story sounded like déjà vu! If what Ms. Hill alleges is true, then just how on earth did the two detectives know that they would have been able to find her in that particular store and at that particular time, a whole year and a half later (after Bob’s murder)?