Police ID 2 men, 2 women slain yesterday

Police this morning identified the two men and two women whose lives were claimed by three shootings and a stabbing yesterday in another bloody day in Philadelphia.

The female victims, both mothers of young children, were killed inside their homes and police believe they knew their killers. One was shot, the other stabbed.

Both men were cut down by gunfire on the streets in different neighborhoods 90 minutes apart.

The four slayings raised the homicide toll for the year to 277, about 20 more than last year.

The first homicide was reported about 7:45 a.m., when police found Inez Vasquez-Rodriguez, 28, shot in the chest in the 500 block of Hill Creek Drive in the Hill Creek Houses in the Crescentville section.

Vasquez-Rodriguez, was pronounced dead at the scene. Her 2-year-old son was found unharmed in the house, police said.

Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson said investigators were looking for a "person of interest" in the case.

Detectives said the shooting may have been sparked by a jealous rage.

Nearly three hours later, a 12-year-old girl found her mother stabbed to death in the front bedroom of their two-story rowhouse on 1400 block of Conlyn Street in the Ogontz section.

Kathryn Green, 30, who suffered multiple stab wounds, was pronounced dead at the scene.

Johnson, who used to live around the corner from the crime scene, said there were no signs of forced entry, and it appeared Green knew her killer.

She lived in the house with her daughters, aged 12 and 5, and her brother, who was not a suspect, police said.

Neighbors said Green's boyfriend also lived in the house, which has black awnings and white roses out front.

One neighbor said he saw Green on Tuesday night putting out the garbage.

Lisa Ivory, who lives two doors down, said she did not know the woman well but described her as neighborly.

"They're really nice people," she said of the residents of the house.

"I feel so bad for her children. What about the kids?" said Ivory, who said the victim had worked caring for the disabled.

Johnson called the slaying of two mothers on one day "very upsetting."

Police were seeking motives in the fatal shootings of the two men.

In the first incident, Riheem Wearen, 29, was shot multiple times about 12:45 p.m. at 22d and Morris Streets in the Point Breeze section, police said.

Wearen, of the 1500 block of Dickinson Street, died at 2:06 p.m. at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.

At 2:13 p.m., police found Sidney Anthony, of the 1300 block of Ridge Avenue, with a gun shot wound to the head in an alley behind a Chinese restaurant on the 1200 block of North 16th Street in Francisville, about a block from St. Joseph's Prep.

The 55-year-old was dead at the scene, officials said.