Police described the assailant as male in his 40s, of medium build with light brown complexion and 5’5″ in height. Photo from Quezon City Police District.
THE Quezon City police issued on Monday the composite sketch of one of the gunmen who attacked broadcaster Anthony Taberna’s coffee shop along Visayas Avenue last Friday.
Based on witness accounts gathered by police, the assailant could be described as man in his 40s, of medium build with light brown complexion and 5’5″ in height.
At 2 a.m. Friday, two armed men peppered Ka Tunying’s coffee shop with bullets, shattering the glass door of the establishment. No one was hurt in the attack. Based on the closed-circuit television footage that captured the shooting, four men on motorcycles were seen outside the establishment; two of them armed while the others served as lookouts.
The attack on the shop of Taberna, an Iglesia Ni Cristo member, came at the height of the mass action launched by INC supporters to protest Justice Secretary Leila de Lima’s alleged “special attention” given to expelled INC ministers. The former church officials are accusing the members of the INC’s Sanggunian of serious illegal detention. The complainant, Isaias Samson Jr., happened to be Taberna’s uncle.
But on Sunday, the 40-year-old Taberna and his wife Rossel joined the massive INC protest at Edsa-Shaw Boulevard and maintained that they went there without pressure from anyone.
According to the security guard of a restaurant near the cafe, before firing at Taberna’s shop, one of the four men approached him and asked, “Pwede ba magtanong, sir? May kargada ka ba?” The guard replied, “Wala po, sir,” and even showed his holster.
The guard said the man, sporting a semi-kalbo (bald) hair, wore a black roundneck shirt, maong pants and slippers.
The man and another accomplice then drew their handguns and fired shots at the coffee shop. They immediately fled and drove to the northbound lane of Visayas Avenue.
Chief Inspector Rodelio Marcelo, chief of the Quezon City Police District’s Criminal Investigation and Detection Unit, said 15 fired cartridge cases of .45-caliber pistol were recovered from the scene. Julliane Love de Jesus
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