A lawyer was shot dead yesterday by unidentified gunmen while he was walking to his office in Cebu City.
Read: Palawan lawyer shot to death while traveling to court hearing
Joey Luis Wee, 51, died from two gunshot wounds while he was being treated at a hospital. The police said that Wee had just stepped out of his car in front of Alchi Business Center at about 1:30pm when the suspects, who were on board a motorcycle, shot him to death.
A partner at Wee, Lim & Salas Law firm, Wee was the counsel of former Rizal, Palawan, Mayor Nicolas Montaño Sr. in the latter’s rape case. He also stood as the lawyer of former Department of Public Works and Highways officials who were allegedly behind the overpricing of lampposts that were installed for the 2007 Association of Southeast Asian Nations Summit.
A graduate of San Beda Law School, he was also the lawyer of National Bureau of Investigation agents who allegedly shot a van carrying several resort workers in Mandaue City in 2003.
Cebu City police are now investigating if the murder is related to Wee’s job. His family said that he was handling a few high profile cases prior to his death. The crime occurred almost a month after another lawyer in Cebu province, James Joseph Gupana, survived an ambush in Lapu-Lapu City. About a week ago, a young lawyer was shot to death in Palawan just as he was driving towards a court hearing.
The Integrated Bar of the Philippines Cebu City chapter condemned Wee’s slay. “The brazen attack on our brother in the legal profession is taken as an attack on the whole legal community,” the organization said.
