(UPDATED) -- Five unidentified men were killed in what was initially reported as an ambush on Thursday dawn, October 4, in Barangay Malubog, Cebu City.
The men succumbed to multiple gunshot wounds.
Police Regional Office-Central Visayas Director Debold Sinas later clarified that it was a shooting incident.
Two persons who survived the shooting said armed men, whom they believed were policemen, brought them in two separate vans to Barangay Malubog and shot them.
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A team from the Scene of the Crime Operatives (Soco) recovered around 30 empty shells of different calibers in the area.
The team also found big packs containing white crystalline substance believed to be methamphetamine hydrochloride, locally known as shabu, inside a van found in the area.
Firearms were also recovered in the vehicle.
The crime scene is near the detachment of Cebu City Mobile Force Company and its personnel were the first to respond.
Two of the dead men were found inside the van, while three others were lying on the ground near two motorcycles.
Senior Police Officer 3 Antonio Din, investigator of Cebu City Police Office-Station 4, said over radio DYHP, the men were possibly involved in illegal drug trade.
He said the transaction possibly went wrong that resulted in the shooting incident.
Most residents said the men killed were strangers in the area.
