Batangas trader robbed, killed

CAMP VICENTE LIM, Laguna — Four unidentified men robbed a 58-year-old businessman of P7 million and shot him dead in front of his house in Lemery, Batangas the other day.

The victim, Celso Aquino, was shot with caliber .45 pistols in the chest, right leg and other parts of the body in front of his house in Barangay Palamas, Lemery town at about 5 p.m., according to Chief Superintendent Domingo Reyes Jr., Southern Tagalog police director.

Police said Aquino managed to shoot it out with the robbers, wounding one of them.

Superintendent Benjamin Belarmino, operations and planning chief of the regional police, said the robbers had tailed Aquino after he withdrew P7 million from the Philippine National Bank for his employees’ salaries.

He said the robbers fled aboard a Lancer with license plate THE 651. — Ed Amoroso