CEBU CITY — A lady lawyer was shot dead while driving her car along a highway in Danao City, northern Cebu last Thursday afternoon.
Baby Maria Concepcion Ole was the second lawyer in Cebu killed by motorcycle-riding assailants in less than a month.
Last Nov. 23, lawyer Joey Luis Wee was gunned down while walking to his office in Barangay Kasambagan, Cebu City.
Both attacks happened in broad daylight.
A former military man, Edgardo Peralta, had been arrested by agents of the National Bureau of Investigation as one of the suspects in the killing of Wee.
Police Maj. Maria Theresa Macatangay, Danao police chief, said Ole was driving a white pick-up truck in Barangay Tabok when she was shot by two motorcycle-riding assailants.
“The victim and the assailants were traveling in the same direction. It appeared the assailants had been tailing her,” said Macatangay.
Police investigation showed that the victim was the wife of an ex-convict, who was killed last May 26 in Barangay Poblacion, Danao.
Juanito Ole had just been released from the National Bilibid Prison (NBP) when he was killed while buying a banana cue.
Macatangay confirmed that Juanito was convicted for illegal drugs.
Macatangay said they are looking into the possibility that the killing of the lady lawyer was job-related.
It was learned that the lawyer refused to handle the case of a convicted criminal serving his sentence at the NBP.
The Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP)-Cebu Province Chapter “vehemently condemned in the strongest terms” the killing of Ole.
“This latest violence adds to the list of numerous unsolved cases of killings in Cebu perpetrated by assassins who remained identified. This attack is not only an attack against the life of an officer of the court but is also an assault to the legal profession and to the rule of law,” the IBP-Cebu Province Chapter said in a statement. (Calvin D. Cordova)
