Lillian Rodriguez didn't sing Karaoke Friday night at Sammy's Bar, but she swiveled to the music in her bar stool as others sang songs.
Rodriguez, 56, a mother, grandmother and soon-to-be great-grandmom, "was a very happy person," said Mayra Delgado, her friend and manager of the North Philadelphia bar.
But early Saturday, Rodriguez's presumed happy life was cut short by Rodriguez's boyfriend inside the bar, on 5th Street near Jefferson. As Delgado closed down Sammy's at about 2:15 a.m., with her back to the couple sitting at the bar, Jose Rodriguez shot Lillian Rodriguez in the head, she said.
The 55-year-old man then turned the gun on himself.
Lillian Rodriguez was pronounced dead at 2:19 a.m. and Jose Rodriguez was pronounced dead at 2:22 a.m., said Officer Jill Russell, a spokeswoman with Philadelphia police.
The couple, who were not married or related, had been together on and off for eight years, Delgado said.
"We really don't know . . . we really don't know what brought this on," Delgado said yesterday at the bar. Regular patrons came by and offered condolences and hugs as she spoke of the killing.
Delgado said that she was counting the night's cash intake when she heard Lillian Rodriguez say in Spanish, "Well, do it."
"As I'm turning around I heard the first shot, then the second shot," Delgado said. Once she heard the first one, "I went down and had my phone on me." She called 9-1-1. Once she finished talking to the dispatcher, she got up "and that's when I saw both of them" on the floor.
Lillian Rodriguez's four daughters gathered at the bar Saturday night for a candlelight vigil to honor her, Delgado said.
In other crime news, all in North Philadelphia:
* An unidentified man, 24, was shot several times around 4:15 a.m. yesterday at 5th and Berks streets, Russell said. The man was pronounced dead at 4:46 a.m. at Temple University Hospital.
* A 38-year-old man was shot several times about 2:30 yesterday morning on 24th Street near Berks, and was in critical condition at Temple University Hospital, Russell said.
* A 27-year-old man was shot in the chest and thigh about 5:20 a.m. yesterday on Sedgley Avenue near 5th Street. He was in critical condition at Temple University Hospital. *
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