The Bacolod City Police Office (BCPO) Station 9 is looking into a work-related issue as the possible motive behind the shooting of a contractor in Bacolod City’s Barangay Sum-ag on Tuesday, July 16.

BCPO Station 9 commander, Police Captain Michael Tuburan, said they are still checking the background of the victim, 39-year-old Gregg Alvin Gelito, to determine the motive of the crime.

Based on police records, a blotter was filed against Gelito in July 2022 for estafa and for violating the bouncing check law.

Tuburan said that in January of this year, the victim received a demand letter from a construction supplier due to an alleged debt of more than P800,000.

In a radio interview yesterday, Gelito’s relatives also insisted that the motive of the crime was not debt.

The relative claimed that the victim received many threats before he was shot to death.

Gelito, a resident of Alunan Baybay in the city’s Barangay 35, allegedly dealt with many big projects, as he was often the lowest bidder.

One of his biggest projects in the reclamation area, the relative said, is scheduled to begin next month.

An initial police investigation said Gelito was about to board his pickup truck after having lunch with his driver, when two unidentified individuals on a motorcycle passed by and shot him in the head.

He was rushed to the South Bacolod General Hospital, but he was declared dead on arrival.

Three empty shells and two deformed .9mm slugs were recovered from the crime scene.

The city police are looking for footage from closed-circuit television cameras as the basis for the investigation.

Gelito was the fourth shooting victim in a series of incidents in the city since last week.

On July 10, the victim, Niño Baldebia, was found dead at Purok Masagana in the city’s Barangay Taculing.

On July 11, Joemarie Villapana was shot dead at Purok Lampirong in Barangay 2, while on Saturday, July 13, a 12-year-old boy was also shot to death on Locsin-Cuadra Streets in Barangay 21.

The minor was one of the companions of alias “Macoy,” the suspect in the abduction and rape of a five-year-old girl in Negros Occidental’s Talisay City.

Earlier, BCPO director Colonel Noel Aliño ordered the immediate resolution of the recent shooting incidents in the city./WDJ