By Jennifer P. Rendon
Two teenage boys were injured after they were shot by motorcycle-riding men shortly after midnight of March 13, 2021 at City Proper district, Iloilo City.
But the case of Richard Bajon, 19, and Ali, 16, both residents of Barangay North Baluarte, Molo, could not be lumped into the usual “riding-in-tandem” incident involving suspected drug peddlers and other alleged criminals.
Instead, it appeared that the two victims and their two friends provoked their assailants.
Initially, the victims told police investigators that they were walking along Ledesma Street, City Proper, when the two suspects passed by and almost sideswiped them.
The riders subsequently parked their bike a few meters from where they encountered the group of young men.
The victims claimed they kicked the motorcycle, which fell to the pavement, then ran away but the two suspects boarded the motorcycle and chased them.
The backrider then shot them, hitting Bajon’s abdomen and arm while Ali was hit on his left thigh.
Bajon was taken to Iloilo Doctors’s Hospital while Ali was treated at the Western Visayas Medical Center.
But the CCTV footages secured by police officers didn’t support the victims’ claims.
Major Mark Evan Salvo, Iloilo City Police Station 1 chief, said that the victims started it all.
The footage showed that the motorcycle was parked along Ledesma Street when the group kicked it for no apparent reason or cause.
They then ran but the two riders went after them. The backrider was later seen firing a handgun at the victims.
Before the shooting episode, witnesses also claimed that the four were seen intentionally breaking glass bottles in the street.
A nearby establishment claimed that the four had been acting unruly, citing that all of them appeared to be under the influence of liquor.
The witness surmised that the two motorcycle riders may have cautioned the boys against creating alarm and scandal in the area.
A village official claimed that the group was heard shouting, “wala pulos mga pulis.”
As this developed, Salvo said they are gathering more evidence to identify the two riders who shot the two victims.
