TUGUEGARAO CITY, Cagayan- A barangay (village) chairman and his treasurer in Benito Soliven town in Isabela province were killed by unknown assailants on Sunday, October 9.
In a police report, Police Chief Inspector Jose Torrijos, the town’s police chief, said two unidentified men broke in and shot the victims, who were preparing an assembly meeting at the barangay hall.
Police identified the victims as Barangay Makindol Chairman Emilio Lazaro, 57, and treasurer Wilson Galapon, 59.
Initial investigations revealed that there two groups of riding in tandem who perpetrated the killing. Torrijos said the other two waited outside the hall.
The victims both sustained head and body gunshot wounds.
Lazaro was proclaimed dead on the arrival at a hospital while Galapon was declared dead on the spot.
A testimony of one of the witnesses narrated that the two suspects, who identified themselves as workers of the bioethanol plant in San Mariano town, were complaining about Lazaro’s cattle allegedly destroying their sugarcane plantation.
Torrijos singled out the angle of illegal drugs as motive of the killing. TNF
