Witness Says He Stood By as Cousin Beat Reporter

It was as if David E. Rosenbaum sensed something in the darkness of Gramercy Street NW.

The 63-year-old journalist, out for a stroll near his home, stopped and looked around for a moment, one of the men accused in his death testified yesterday. But Rosenbaum didn't see anything, and by the time he did, it was too late.

Seconds later, Percey Jordan jumped Rosenbaum from behind and began beating the retired New York Times reporter with a heavy plastic pipe, Jordan's cousin said in D.C. Superior Court.

"Give it up, old man, give it up, old man," Jordan yelled, according to his cousin, Michael Hamlin, who testified in the second day of Jordan's trial before a jury in Judge Erik P. Christian's courtroom.

"It took him by surprise because it happened so quick," Hamlin said of the attack, which unfolded about 9 p.m. Jan. 6 in the 3800 block of Gramercy.

Jordan struck him twice in the head and three times in the torso, Hamlin said, and Rosenbaum staggered and crumpled to the sidewalk as Hamlin rushed in and ripped Rosenbaum's wallet from his hip pocket.

Two days later, Rosenbaum succumbed to his wounds, and a few days after that, the men suspected of killing him turned themselves in to police after store surveillance images linked them to the crime.

Not until yesterday had Hamlin, 24, provided a public account of what he says happened that night. Dressed in dark blue jail-issue shirt and pants, Hamlin sounded contrite at times, at one point choking up and pausing to regain his composure.

Facing his cousin across the courtroom, Hamlin, who pleaded guilty last month to murder, laid the worst acts of that night on Jordan -- an accusation that Jordan's attorney, Michael Starr, has assailed as a self-serving lie.

Hamlin kept changing his story during his interrogation by police in January, authorities said, and Starr said his testimony is only the latest in a series of fabrications.

Hamlin insisted yesterday that he was telling the truth. He said the trouble began after he came home from his job at a trash hauling company, took his mother to her Friday night card game and set out on a ride with his cousin, listening to oldies music along the way. "Let's go, cuz, let's go, cuz," Hamlin recalled Jordan, 42, telling him that night once they reached Wisconsin Avenue. Hamlin's planned dinner in Bethesda with a lady friend could wait, but the robbery Jordan was itching to do could not, Hamlin said he was told.

"I gave him a look, but I agreed to do it," Hamlin said during questioning by the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney Amanda Haines.