MOVE told negotiators attempting to avert a crisis at the last mintue that if the city could refute any claim regarding past improper legal procedures, and if any one official would initiate an honest investigation of the 1978 incident, MOVE would call off the confrontation. Officials and the media ignored this.

On May 8th, Alfonso Africa was sentenced to 5 years for threatening an officer during a prior arrest. On May 11th, police obtained an arrest warrant for Alfonso (even though he was already in jail) and used it two days later to justify a tear gas assault on Alfonso's home in Chester, Pennsylvania. The only adult present, his wife Mary, was arrested and their 5 children were taken away as police ransacked the house.

To provide a legal basis for the Osage Avenue attack, Judge Lynne Abraham signed arrest warrants on May 11th for Ramona, Conrad, Frank and Teresa Africa on charges of disorderly conduct and terroristic threats. The next day police evacu-ated the 6200 block of Osage Avenue and towed away parked cars.

On Monday, May 13th, police and firemen launched a full scale military assault on the MOVE row house using tear gas, water cannons, shot guns, Uzi's, M-16's, silenced weapons, Browning Automatic Rifles, M-60 machine guns, a 20mm anti-tank gun, and a 50 caliber machine gun. Some of these weapons were illegally obtained with the help of the U.S. Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms Agency.

Between 6:00 and 7:30 am, police flooded the area with tear gas and fired over 10,000 rounds of ammunition at the house knowing there were women and chil-dren inside. They also tried to blast through the walls with the military explosives the FBI had illegally provided. None of these measures succeeded in driving MOVE from the house. Late in the afternoon, a state police helicopter was used to drop a bomb on the roof which started a fire that officials deliberately allowed to burn. It soon spread to the adjoining row houses, eventually burning down the entire block of some 60 homes.