VANCOUVER -- Metro Vancouver’s bloody gang war, which has claimed more than 20 lives already this year, has spread to other regions with one man dead on Vancouver Island and another killed in Alberta.

RCMP in Nanaimo have linked a Thursday shooting death in that city to the Lower Mainland gang conflict.

Over in Alberta, police in Calgary have not yet identified a man shot dead in the city’s southwest on Saturday evening, but CTV News Vancouver has learned he is Gurkeert Kalkat, a member of the Brothers Keepers gang.

His fate is eerily similar to that of his brother Jaskeert Kalkat who was killed in a hail of gunfire in the parking lot of Burnaby’s Market Crossing on May 13.

In both cases, getaway vehicles were found torched a short time later.

“One day they’re the suspect, the next day they’re the victim. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the case in this particular dispute,” said Kash Heed, a retired West Vancouver police chief and former Solicitor General of B.C.

Heed suspects the Kalkat brothers may have been killed for revenge.

In Nanaimo, it was 3:30 on Thursday afternoon when shots rang out in the parking lot of a fast-food restaurant, leaving one man dead in a luxury SUV.

Witnesses saw another SUV racing away from the scene and Nanaimo RCMP later took three people into custody at a Best Western Hotel.

Although police say the shooting is connected to Lower Mainland gangs, the three people arrested were later released pending further investigation.

RCMP are canvassing for surveillance video of the Nanaimo attack, hoping to track the movements of a white 2003 Cadillac Escalade believed to be involved in the murder.

Heed says the violence could be spreading to other cities as gangs look to expand their criminal operations – but he said in some cases it could be a case of gang members getting out of town because they fear they could be the next to be marked for death.

“These individuals most likely know that there are targets on their backs and they’re leaving particular areas,” he said. “They’re moving across Metro Vancouver, they’re moving across British Columbia, and now it appears they’re making their way to Alberta.”

But the gangsters looking to settle scores and kill their rivals are also on the move, and somehow seem to be able to find their targets wherever they may be attempting to hide.