Karen Valentina Vega Peralta was tragically gunned down alongside her innocent best friend after a night out in northern Colombia over the weekend, with two masked bikers fleeing the scene
An adult model understood to be dating a gang leader has been ambushed and shot alongside her best friend by a pair of masked motorcyclists.
A manhunt is now underway for the two alleged assassins, who fled on a blue and white Suzuki DR 150 after the shooting at around 2:40am Sunday in Girón, northern Colombia.
Karen Valentina Vega Peralta – who made her money as a webcam model – and friend Nicol Cristina Amaya Díaz, both 20, died from the attack over the weekend.
Peralta was in a relationship with a member of the “Los del Sur” (Those from the South) drug trafficking crime group, police sources told El Tiempo. She was shot in the shoulder and chest, with her body left on the road.
“It has been established that there was a romantic relationship with a man who belongs to a criminal organization,” Bucaramanga Metropolitan Police commander William Quintero confirmed, without identifying the criminal.
He added that the work of the judicial unit allowed them to “determine that one of the women had a relationship with a man who was involved in drug trafficking in nightclubs.” The cop confirmed that this man is part of an organized crime group that operates actively throughout the Bucaramanga metropolitan area.
Peralta, who also worked as a nurse, is thought to have been the primary target of the shooters, with Diaz tragically caught in the crossfire. Diaz was rushed to a local hospital with bullet wounds but could not be saved.
Police claim the motorcycle-riding killers followed the women from their night out and then ambushed them.
Authorities have also formed a “specialised team” in order to find the masked killers.
General William Quintero reported that it is “a special intelligence group from our Judicial Police, working in conjunction with the Prosecutor’s Office and the CTI (Technical Investigation Corps), to locate, prosecute, and capture those responsible for these acts.”