PHILADELPHIA -- She was the witness whose name had been kept secret, until Thursday.

In court for a preliminary hearing, the woman sobbed as she told a judge she was about to plant flowers outside her Port Richmond home when she witnessed the killing of police Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski on the morning of May 3.

The woman, whose identity NBC 10 is withholding, gasped as the district attorney held the SKS rifle investigators said was used to kill Liczbinski and told the court after the sergeant's killing the gunman pointed the weapon at her.

---

Images: Bank Robbery Surveillance
Video Report

---

"At one time or another, during the commission of this robbery and the murder of Sgt. Liczbinski, every single one of those defendants had their hands on that gun," Assistant District Attorney Mark Gilson said.

Prosecutors said all three of the men involved in the robbery of a Bank of America that day played a role in the killing of Liczbinski.

The police sergeant's family sat in the court and listened to the hours of testimony and couldn't hide emotions when prosecutors played Liczbinski's last radio call, when he told dispatchers he was stopping the suspected getaway car of three bank robbers.

"As these men were trying to make good their escape, to get to their second vehicle -- the van that they had stashed in the neighborhood, Sgt Liczbinski got on them and followed them, and they just couldn't shake him," Gilson said. "And when they couldn't shake him, they decided they were going to kill him."

A judge ruled that all charges will stand for trial against suspects Eric Floyd and Levon Warner.

Howard Cain was shot dead by police after Liczbinski's shooting.

Prosecutors said the suspects carjacked a Jeep to rob a bank branch inside a supermarket, located at Aramingo Avenue and Castor Street, and planned the heist for May 2.

Instead, investigators said they ditched that plan at last minute, only to return the next day after a second getaway car was stashed nearby. Two of the three dressed in Muslim garb, they were heavily armed and they made off with more than $40,000 in cash.

Prosecutors alleged it was Cain who was the ringleader and the gunman who shot Liczbinski as they tried to get away in a stolen Jeep.

"It was Floyd who said, 'We got to bang him.' They couldn't shake him, so they had to bang him, they had to kill him," Gilson said.

Warner was arrested after the sergeant's killing. Floyd was on the run for five days before being caught in Southwest Philadelphia last week.

In police statements, both Warner and Floyd admitted their roles in the robbery, but police said they both claimed to have had no idea a police officer was going to be shot.

According to testimony, Floyd included an apology to the Liczbinski family, saying the sergeant's killing has changed his life.

Prosecutors said the remorse is phony.

"Save your crocodile tears for someone else. He was in, up to his eyeballs, over his head, in from the beginning. And then what does he try to do when he's caught, when he's had five days to think about it? He blames the dead guy," Gilson said.

On Wednesday, Mitchell Kain -- who was charged in the carjacking and who prosecutors said was supposed to be in on the robbery -- was in court.

It's likely he'll plead guilty and testify against the shooting suspects, prosecutors said.

Floyd's mother waived at her son through a glass wall. She made no comment about the case.

But Cain's cousin attempted to speak to the Liczbinski family. He said he wanted to give them a message.

"I want to apologize to their family and friends of the police officer to show my family does have honor," said the cousin, Earl Capehart.

Defense attorneys for Floyd and Warner left the courthouse without offering comment.

Prosecutors said that, as of now, no deals have been made with either defendant and they said that, right now, they don't want to make any deals, NBC 10's Deanna Durante reported.