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Charter Member
'HATE' KILLED NYU KID
By LARRY CELONA, ERIKA MARTINEZ and CYNTHIA R. FAGEN
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April 6, 2006 -- The NYPD hate-crimes unit is probing a report that a white NYU student killed by a car in Harlem was fleeing a gang of black teenagers screaming "Get ******!" sources said yesterday.
If the report proves true, the violence could turn out to be an eerie replay in reverse of the infamous 1986 Howard Beach murder, where a black man was chased into traffic and killed by a group of white bigots.
The 20-year-old student, John Broderick Hehman, died yesterday, six days after the attack.
The sources said Hehman might have been targeted as a soft mark for robbers after the teenage gang spotted the caring urban-studies major handing pocket change to a wheelchair- bound man near the corner of 125th Street and Park Avenue Saturday night.
The gang of youths, some of them as young as 11, had been smoking pot inside a nearby Popeye's fast-food eatery at 8:30 p.m. when they spotted Hehman walking by and then stopping to help the handicapped man.
An anonymous caller later tipped the CrimeStoppers hot line that a group of youths screamed, "Get ******!" and ran toward him.
Witnesses said Hehman fled into traffic against the light and was hit by a Mercedes-Benz traveling east on 125th Street.
The 38-year-old driver remained at the scene and was not charged.
"When we heard the crash, we thought it was two cars - it was such a loud noise," said a witness.
"I couldn't believe it was a person," he said.
Hehman, known as "J.B.," had been in a coma since he was struck.
He died of massive head trauma at Harlem Hospital.
His sister, Marisa, said he had been walking to meet a friend when he was attacked.
His father, Manhattan investment banker Thomas Hehman, lives on the Upper East Side.
On a student Web site, Hehman joked his off-campus interests included "doing laundry."
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/64110.htm

