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2013 IN REVIEW: The Kaboni Savage Murder Case

By Tony Hanson

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- A federal jury in Philadelphia returned historic verdicts this year in the case against a notorious drug gang leader -- a man responsible for crimes that shocked the conscience and the community.

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The jury convicted Kaboni Savage of 12 murders, the most in modern Philadelphia history, and then sentenced him to death  -- the first death penalty in this federal district since the penalty was reinstated in 1988.

The murders included six victims in a single stunning act of violence in 2004:   Savage ordered the firebombing of the home of a witness against him. The blaze killed the witness's mother, baby son, and four others.

The evidence included chilling, secretly recorded tapes.  Savage didn't testify in this murder trial but did in an earlier drug case, in which he admitted threatening witnesses.

Savage was also caught on tape making vile jokes about the victims burned to death in the fire.

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