A BARANGAY councilor in Lipa City, Batangas was gunned down on the same night that a former vice mayor of Santo Tomas town, also in Batangas province, was wounded in a separate gun attack.
Romel Cuento was shot dead by two motorcycle-riding suspects around 6:35 p.m. Saturday, July 14, while he was talking to a former barangay official in Purok 6A.
Senior Inspector Hazel Suarez, public information officer of Batangas Police provincial office, said Cuento was declared dead on arrival at a local hospital.
He sustained several gunshot wounds in the body.
Suarez said police conducted hot pursuit operations against the gunmen who fled towards the town of Padre Garcia.
About an hour later in Sto. Tomas town, former vice mayor Ferdinand Ramos of Santo Tomas town was wounded after an unidentified gunman shot him as he was walking home in Barangay Poblacion 2.
Ramos survived the attack at 7:25 p.m. Saturday but sustained a gunshot wound in the face.
Cuento was the fourth local government official gunned down in Luzon this month, after Tanauan City Mayor Antonio Halili, General Tinio Mayor Ferdinand Bote and Trece Martires City Vice Mayor Alexander Lubigan.
Police have said there were different motives in these killings amid concerns raised by government critics on the emerging culture of violence in the country. (SunStar Philippines)