Youths to stand trial for shooting

PANAMA. Two young men 16 and 17 were indicted Wednesday for the attempted murder of Chorrillo community organizer Héctor Avila.

Judge Katia Ponce issued the indictment and set a trial date for October 9 after a preliminary hearing in the First Juvenile Penal Court

The attempt on Avila’s life took place on the night of May 23 this year.

Assailants lay in wait for him outside the entrance of his apartment building on Calle 23.

While one stood guard, the other shot Avila four times with a 9 mm. automatic

According to Avila, the two have kept silent about their motive.

He, however, relates the attack to the insistent calls he made on his twice-weekly radio program for the fulfillment of the testament of Wilson Lucom the American investor, who died here in June 2006, leaving a legacy valued at $50 million to feed poor children in Panama, but a powerful family is trying to overturn his will

A few days before the attempt on his life, Avila led a poor children&

He was urging action in the case, which has been stuck there for almost two years. while Lucom’s widow attempts to overturn the will.

According to the Panama charity organization Nutre Hogar, two children die of hunger every three days in the Ngöbe Buglé Indian Reservation

The first bullet hit the 62 year- old Avila in the right shoulder. The next traversed his right thigh, knocking him down.

The shooter then held his pistol to Avila&

With his victim face down on the pavement, the would be assassin fired what would have been a fatal shot behind the right ear, but the bullet glanced miraculously off the skull bone.

Avila survived to identify his assailants and detectives took them into custody the next day.

At the hearing, Assistant Prosecutor Mirella Quiros presented proof that a weapon in the shooter’s possession was linked by ballistics to bullets that wounded Avila.

The assailants’ names were withheld because they are under age

Avila, who has made a career of combating gang violence in his neighborhood, acknowledges that minors are often sought as hired killers because of the special treatment they receive if caught

The crusading community organizer is far from intimidated.

"Nothing can stop my fight to have Lucom&

"What happened only gives me more strength to continue."