2 men, 3 boys hurt in Lorega shooting

At least five people, three of them minors, were injured in a shooting spree—reminiscent of the drive-by shooting in the past—by two men on a red motorcycle using a submachine pistol along New Imus Road at barangay Lorega-San Miguel yesterday dawn.

The injured victims were Thadeo Camacho, 18, Crisanto Sanchez, 42, and three boys—two 17-year-olds and a 16-year-old. All of them were taken to the Cebu City Medical Center while the still unidentified attackers sped off towards barangay Day-as.

Camacho was hit in the chest and left leg, Sanchez in his chest, the 16-year-old boy in both his legs, and his 17-year-old brother in the left arm and left shoulder. The other 17-year-old victim was hit in his left leg.

This teenager was identified as a member of the Alpha Kappa Rho gang but the police said that it could not be determined yet if the shooting had something to do with rivalries of gangs.

Homicide investigator SPO1 Geoffrey Gutual said that Camacho and the three minors were talking with two members of the Bloods gang, known only as Jojie and Wewaks, while they were seated on a folding bed laid out by the roadside when the motorcycle of the two men arrived and stopped near them.

Gutual said the backrider was the one who opened fire, hitting four in the group and Sanchez who was just standing nearby outside his home. There were no reports where the two Bloods gangmen went during and after the attack.

One of the victims was however able to identify the backrider as his former friend, known as Eric and sometimes Titing, who is a resident of barangay Cogon-Ramos and a member of the Crips gang.

Police were also looking into possible connection of the incident with what happened on Good Friday when three men, two of them minors, were shot and wounded in R.R. Landon Street at barangay San Antonio.

Yesterday, a 20-year-old man, identifying himself as Eric who lives in Cogon-Ramos and a member of Crips, went to the city police homicide section office to clear his name. Subsequent checks found him negative and the victims also failed to identify him as the one who shot them.

Last September and October, the city was rocked by a series of drive-by shootings that claimed the lives of five people and wounding eight others.

The police, after arresting Akrho member Aristotle Aves as one of the suspects to the crimes, had described those incidents as gang-related violence between Akrho and its rival Tau Gamma Phi. Aves however denied all the accusations against him. — Edwin Ian Melecio/RAE