TACLOBAN CITY- Four people, two of them were children, were shot by still unidentified armed men while they were on board a vehicle on Sunday (July 21) at about 6 pm in Jaro, Leyte.
Two of the victims, Leopoldo Po, 44 and said to be a businessman, and his wife Ailen, 40 and a teacher by profession, are now in critical conditions after they were hit in their heads, Captain Arnel Saremgumba, police chief of Jaro town, said.
The other victims, Estrella Geraldo, 62 and a village chairwoman of San Pedro, Tunga town, also in Leyte, and Rachel Cuña, 27, were hit at the lower back of their bodies but are now in stable conditions.
Geraldo’s husband, Wilfredo, 62, and Cuña’s children, Estefanie, 6, and Sheena, 4, were unharmed.
Capt. Saregumba, in a phone interview, said that the victims, on board a Suzuki Ertega, were heading to Tacloban City from their village of San Pedro, Tunga town.
And while cruising Barangay Hibucawan, two kms away from Jaro town proper, they were chased by the still unidentified suspects who were also on board a vehicle and shot them several times.
This resulted for the vehicle, driven by Leopoldo Po, to fell on a bridge, as he lost control of the steering wheel.
The Po couple were hit on their heads while Geraldo and Cuña were hit at the lower back of their bodies. Both are said on stable conditions.
The rescuers of the Municipal Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office (MDRRMO) who responded to the scene brought all the victims to the hospital at the region’s capital.
Saremguba said that they have yet to unmask the suspects and their motive.
“We are still conducting our probe on the incident,” he said.
Recovered from the crime scene were two deformed fired cartridge cases that were turned over to regional police headquarters for ballistic examination.(ELVIE ROMAN ROA)
