A kiss before dying

CEBU CITY — A DECS security guard kissed his pretty lover goodbye inside a taxi at the reclamation area yesterday morning, shot her twice, once in the head and then in the body, then turned the gun on his own head.

It was not clear why Antonio Tomada shot Melinda Pacilan but the woman’s sister speculated it might have been to prevent the woman from leaving for abroad to get married with her penpal.

Pacilan, 27, worked as a cashier at a freight handling company while Tomada worked as a security guard at the Cebu City schools division of the DECS.

Tomada used to be married but the marriage had reportedly been annulled and his former wife was now living with her new family abroad. Pacilan lived in a rented room on Don Pedro Cui Street while Tomada lived nearby, on the same street.

Tomada and Pacilan took the taxi in front of SM City at about 8:40 a.m. and asked the driver to take them to Pier 7 where the office of Pacilan was located.

Taxi driver Bernard Angulo told police he saw through the rear view mirror Tomada kissing Pacilan shortly after they had seated themselves in the back.

Tomada kissed Pacilan again and the driver heard the woman ask Tomada what was eating him. Tomada reportedly did not reply.

Shortly after, the driver heard two loud explosions. He glanced back into the mirror and saw the woman slumped against the side window and Tomada with a gun in his right hand.

The cab eventually got stalled by traffic near the Mabolo fire station and at this point Tomada held the gun to his head and squeezed the trigger. Pacilan’s elder sister Analyn, suspects Tomada killed Melinda to prevent her from going to Alaska where her American boyfriend lives.

The American boyfriend recently came to Cebu to prepare the travel papers of Melinda. He left only last Jan. 18.

Tomada had reportedly threatened to kill himself should Melinda ever leave him. — Freeman News Service