ILOILO City – The Roxas City Police Office (RCPO) is looking at two possible motives in Sunday’s murder of the municipal administrator of Pilar, Capiz.
John Heredia, 54, was shot to death in front of a hardware store in Barangay Lawa-an, Roxas City by masked motorcycle-riding gunmen.
“It might be work-related,” Police Lieutenant Colonel Ricardo Jomuad Jr., RCPO chief, told Panay News.
“Or it might be his being an active supporter of government programs,” he said, citing the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC) in particular.
To note, two hooded suspects were seen fleeing the crime scene onboard a red Bajaj motorcycle, footage from a closed circuit television (CCTV) showed.
“We have some copies of the CCTV footage. We hope we can get the clear copy of their facial identity, including the motorcycle they used as a getaway vehicle,” Jomuad said.
‘SPECIAL TASK FORCE’
Yesterday, the RCPO and the Capiz Police Provincial Office (CPPO) convened and created a special taskforce that would solely focus on solving the crime.
“We are asking help from the public who saw the incident so that justice will be given to the victim’s family,” Jomuad said.
Heredia – former chairman of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines-Capiz chapter – died of fatal gunshot wounds.
He was rushed to the Capiz Doctor’s Hospital where he was declared “dead on arrival.”
Police recovered four spent shells of a .45-caliber pistol from the crime scene.
Heredia was the husband of human rights lawyer Criselda Heredia who survived an ambush in September 2019. Her car was peppered with bullets that time./PN
