Youth Minister Shot to Death

PHILADELPHIA — An apparently stray bullet killed a youth minister as he sat in a church van with members of his congregation.

Nafes Johnson, 19, and four members of Greater St. Matthew’s Baptist Church were being driven home after a Friday night service, police said.

Johnson, sitting behind the driver, was struck in the head and died at a hospital early Saturday. No one else was injured, said Lt. Richard Ross.

The bullet appeared to have been fired from about a block away in a shooting over a drug deal, Police Commissioner John Timoney said.

No one had been arrested Saturday.

Johnson gave his first sermon last week.

He was shot just five blocks from a schoolyard where a 6-year-old girl was wounded by a stray bullet on April 4.

Johnson had planned to transfer to Philadelphia Bible College in the fall, his pastor said.

“A young man not on drugs or on the streets. A young man not involved in the criminal justice system. Yes, he beat the odds,” said the Rev. Steven Avinger. “And yet, in a very real way, he didn’t. Because he will go down as another young black male shot to death.”