Brockton ex-witness fatally wounded

A Brockton man who was shot last year just before his scheduled testimony in a murder trial was fatally wounded yesterday by gunshots when he answered the door to a unit in a Brockton apartment building.

David Gomes, 29, was pronounced dead at 12:57 a.m. at Brockton Hospital, authorities said. It remains unclear if his killing had anything to do with his involvement in the Manuel Resende murder trial last year.

''Investigators would certainly consider that, but at this point there is no indication it has anything to do with this shooting," said Bridget Norton Middleton, spokeswoman for Plymouth District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz, whose office is investigating Gomes's killing.

In June 2005, prosecutors planned to call Gomes in the murder trial of Manuel Gomes, no relation, who was accused of fatally shooting 19-year-old Resende in a Brockton bar in 2002.

Hours before his testimony, David Gomes was shot several times in the chest. Middleton would not say whether prosecutors ever established that the motive for the 2005 shooting was to prevent him from testifying.

In the end, David Gomes did not testify, refusing to do so after prosecutors declined to grant him broad immunity. Manuel Gomes was acquitted.

RAJA MISHRA