PHILADELPHIA _ Four people have been found fatally shot, execution-style, in the basement of a home under renovation in the Cedar Park section of West Philadelphia, police said Monday afternoon.
Two women and two men in their 20s or 30s were found in the 5100 block of Malcolm Street, all with gunshot wounds to the head, police said. Medics pronounced them dead at 12:21 p.m.
"Sadly, all four of these individuals were executed, there's no ifs, ands, or buts about it," Police Commissioner Richard Ross said. "This is an absolutely evil thing to do. ... There is no way in the world people should have met their demise this way."
Ross, speaking to reporters at the scene, said police received a call Monday morning to check on the welfare of people at the house. Responding officers found the four bodies in the unfinished basement, he said.
Ross said police were not sure how long the bodies had been in the basement, but said a neighbor had reported hearing a couple of "bangs" Sunday night. Ross said the neighbor assumed the bangs were related to the upstairs renovation.
Ross said police believe that the victims were led into the basement, because their hands and feet were not bound or tied. He added that there were no obvious signs of a struggle inside the home.
No names were released. Ross said the two men may have been cousins.
Police were not immediately certain how many weapons were used in the slayings. They were still seeking witnesses and possible surveillance video.
Ross said he didn't know who owns the house.
Property records show that the property was bought for $3 by an Alice Jones on Aug. 19, 2009.
The current market value of the property is $23,200, and taxable improvements are set at $16,000.
The property was issued two violations in 2014 for garbage and overgrown weeds, both of which were rectified.
Outside on Monday, a dozen onlookers watched as detectives collected evidence.
One onlooker, Lucille Walker, who has lived in the area for at least 30 years, described the event as "shocking."
"I'm a little perturbed," she said. "It's an atrocity."
Another onlooker, Beth Harrell, an emergency room nurse at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, said she was frightened by the violence on a block that her mother can see from her home on nearby Baltimore Avenue.
"When something like this happens at your doorstep," she said, "it's scary."
