The mur­der toll rose to 97 yes­ter­day fol­low­ing three killings in two sep­a­rate shoot­ings in Diego Mar­tin and Cara­pichaima on Thurs­day night.

In the first in­ci­dent on March 27, at Gopaul Av­enue, Diego Mar­tin, two men died at hos­pi­tal af­ter gun­men opened fire on the car they were seat­ed in.

The vic­tims who lat­er died at hos­pi­tal, were iden­ti­fied as Bran­don Shock­ness, 29, of Gokool Street, Diego Mar­tin and Kea­gan Fran­cis, 31, of Win­nie Mo­hammed Road, Diego Mar­tin.

Res­i­dents re­port­ed hear­ing gun­shots just af­ter 10 pm and alert­ed po­lice who ar­rived and found the in­jured men in the ve­hi­cle.

They were lat­er tak­en to the St James In­fir­mary where they died min­utes apart.

A to­tal of 15 spent 9 mm shells were re­cov­ered at the scene, along with a sil­ver Nis­san Ti­i­da that had been dam­aged. —An­na-Lisa Paul