By Jennifer P. Rendon
Police investigators revealed that a gun-for-hire was behind the assassination of an Indian national on July 2 in Mandurriao, Iloilo City.
Captain Val Cambel, chief of Iloilo City Police Station 5, said they received a tip regarding the identity of the gunman.
“The suspect’s build matched the gunman we saw on the CCTV footage,” he said, but declined to elaborate further on the gunman’s identity.
“We are also focusing on identifying the mastermind behind the killing,” he added.
Investigators believe that either personal grudges or business interests motivated the assassination of 29-year-old Jatinder Singh.
Singh was about to park his motorcycle at his rented place at Imperial 5 Subdivision on Guzman-Jesena Streets, Mandurriao, when he was shot.
The victim suffered two gunshot wounds on his back, one of which went through his arm.
No one apparently witnessed the actual shooting. Singh’s landlady informed the police about the incident.
Responding officers rushed Singh to Western Visayas Medical Center, where he was declared dead on arrival.
Like many Indian nationals in the country, Singh was involved in the lending business and operated in Iloilo City and the province of Iloilo.
He had been living alone and had conflicts with some Indian nationals in the area, Cambel said.
Cambel also noted that Singh had been jailed several times for complaints of “alarm and scandal” when he was drunk.
Meanwhile, Cambel said Singh was cremated several hours after the incident. A sibling is expected to arrive in the country to bring his ashes back to India.
