New York City ? Officers have raided at least one home, picked up the son of a clergyman for an unpaid ticket and scoured vacant lots with a leave-no-stone-unturned intensity akin to a manhunt in a murder case. But the search has nothing to do with a fugitive killer.

Instead, police are trying to locate a key witness – and perhaps a missing gun – in hopes of explaining why five police officers unleashed a 50-shot barrage that killed a man on his wedding day outside a strip club last week.

Police critics on Friday warned of a backlash: They claim the search has created a climate of fear in a community already outraged by the death of Sean Bell, 23, and the wounding of two other unarmed men who attended his bachelor party at the club.

They say police have concocted a “phantom gunman” in a desperate effort to show that officers were justified in opening fire.