Neighbors who witnessed Thursday night's confrontation say Philadelphia police are covering up the truth. And they claim cops on the scene, most of whom were white, used the "n" word at Kwende Williams, 20 and residents after the shooting.

A friend of Williams, who would give her name only as Hasana H., said she witnessed cops pull up beside Williams as he left a corner store at 29th Street and Huntingdon. He began to run, and police followed, yelling at him, "Throw the gun down or I'm gonna shoot your ass up," she recalled.

Multiple witnesses said yesterday that police were chasing Williams down Newkirk and, as he eluded authorities, he threw a gun into a vacant lot.

"After he threw the gun, the cops shot him three times" in the back, said Christina, who said she saw the shooting from her house and asked that the Daily News withhold her last name. "Never once did he turn around and look. The cops were behind him. I knew he was wrong for carrying a gun, but he never pointed the gun at the cops." "Why'd they have to shoot him [three] times in the back?" asked friend Latoya Armstrong.

The witnesses said that once Williams fell, police handcuffed him and kicked him as he bled on the sidewalk.

"I've seen them kicking him, called him a n-----," Hawthorne said. "F--- this n-----," police said, according to Hawthorne. Armstrong and others said police began shoving and pushing residents who openly criticized them for the shooting. "The cops didn't care," she said. "No type of remorse for anybody. The cops were just mean.