Caloocan ambush kills 3

CAMARIN residents thought they heard firecrackers, until they saw this bullet-riddled vehicle. Radyo Inquirer

An early-morning ambush in Caloocan City killed three people inside a pickup truck and left police investigators still clueless regarding the motive for the attack.

About six masked gunmen fired on a maroon Nissan Navarra (NUI-501) as it was passing through Pili Street, Barangay 178, Camarin, around 3 a.m., killing the woman and two men inside, the Caloocan police said.

A Radyo Inquirer report identified the fatalities as John Albert Paredes, who was driving the pickup; his girlfriend Kanis Leona, and their friend Benjamin Ramos.

The families of the victims, who confirmed their identities upon seeing the bodies at a funeral parlor hours after the attack, had deferred giving a statement as to the possible reason for the killings, GMA Network’s 24 Oras reported last night.

PO3 Rhyan Rodriguez, the case investigator, said the victims died inside the bullet-riddled vehicle after sustaining gunshot wounds in the head and body.

Around 30 bullet casings from .45-caliber and 9-mm pistols were found at the crime scene.

Witnesses recalled seeing five to six assailants fire at the vehicle before running to motorbikes parked nearby and speeding off, Rodriguez said.

As the shooting lasted for several minutes, residents initially thought that someone had set off a long array of firecrackers known as “Judas belt.”

One witness claimed that there were shots that also came from inside the vehicle, but this could not be immediately confirmed as there were no firearms recovered, the officer said.

It took long for the police to identify the victims as the first officers to arrive at the scene found no IDs or other helpful documents in the vehicle—except for insurance papers indicating that the pickup was registered to a Joey Susano of Deparo, Caloocan. Kristine Felisse Mangunay and Radyo Inquirer