4 angles eyed in ‘Ngongo’ slay try

SAN FERNANDO CITY — Pampanga police are eyeing four angles behind the attempted assassination Sunday evening of Melchor Caluag alias "Ngongo," suspected to be one of the biggest gambling lords in Central Luzon.

Sr. Superintendent Rodolfo Mendoza, Pampanga provincial police director said that while there were no clues yet on the identity of the suspects, investigators are eyeing rivals in jueteng operations, a vigilante group, communist guerrillas or even elements in the police or the military.

Mendoza said he would not rule out the possibility that some police and military men might be involved in the shooting, amid reports that Caluag had also been providing them protection money.

He also said that a vigilante group, known as the Red vigilante Group could be a suspect.

The group had earlier admitted the execution of a suspected drug lord and a suspected carnapper in Nueva Ecija.

Meanwhile, Pampanga police are now providing tight security for Caluag who is now out of danger at the St. Luke’s Hospital in Quezon City after surviving three gunshot wounds inflicted by still unidentified suspects in Barangay Dolores here early Monday night.

Sr. Superintendent Sonny Cunanan, the city police chief, said he ordered the tight security so Caluag could provide information on who could be the suspects.

Caluag and a companion, Ariel Trinidad, had just left a Shakey’s pizza outlet near the Mel-Vin building he owned along the San Fernando-Olongapo-Gapan road in Dolores when two still unidentified men fired at least six times at them at about 6:45 p.m. Sunday.

Caluag sustained two wounds in his belly and one in the left shoulder. Trinidad was hit in the left hand.

After hitting the two, the suspects boarded their vehicle and fled aboard a jeep. Their vehicle was later found abandoned at the parking area of Robinson’s shopping mall, less than a kilometer away from the scene of the crime.

Caluag was initially rushed in critical condition to the Makabali Hospital here. He was later moved to St. Luke’s where doctors pronounced him out of danger although he remained unconscious after three bullets were removed from his abdomen and shoulder.

Trinidad who also suffered a gunshot would was not hospitalized.

Cunanan said two persons held after the shooting were released yesterday morning after they tested negative in paraffin tests.