Warning of the risk of gang retaliation, Boston police are appealing to the public for help finding the suspects who gunned down two Cape Verdean men in their car before a fiery crash in Dorchester last night.

“What we are worrying about now and what we are gearing up for is the retaliation factor,” Police Commissioner William B. Evans said. “Clearly I think it was a gang-related incident and that’s why we need people to step up and or we will have more bloodshed. When you have one shooting, it usually leads to retaliation.”

Cops responded to the incident last night around 10:23 p.m. and the two victims were pronounced dead at the scene.

Domingos DaRosa, an at-large Boston city council candidate, said the two victims are longtime friends.

“When we were younger, (one friend) and I used to ride motorcycles and dirt bikes together,” DaRosa said. “We would meet in Brockton and drive over to a lot behind the UPS building there, then we would go and ride our dirt bikes and we would just hang out.”

He said an older brother of one victim was murdered in Brockton several years ago.

“They are still dealing with those emotions,” he said. “It just sucks they have to go through it again, it’s one of those things you don't wish on anybody.”

DaRosa said he also feared more bloodshed could be imminent.

“The kids who hang on Elder Street are going to want to retaliate and are not going to see the benefit of life, they are just going to have a lot of anger and questions that no one can answer,” he said. “My biggest worry is a lot of these kids are going to continue the cycle not knowing that more violence is not going to help.”

Evans speculated the incident could be related to a June bust of more than two dozen members of the Wendover Street and Cameron Street gangs — a pair of feuding Cape Verdean gangs in Dorchester.

“That are right there, we've had some incidents of Cape Verdean violence,” Evans said.

The crime startled neighbors on the narrow, one-way Dorchester street.

“I heard the gun shots and then my daughter called me and said I should come outside. When I came out I saw the car next to my car,” said Rosmund Johnfinn, 53, whose car was slammed into by the car with the two victims inside. “By the time I came out, the fire had gone out on the car but there were a lot of people out there and the police and the ambulances. I just thought, ‘Oh my God, what happened?' I was just surprised. It’s just pretty sad because it could have been my kids too.”

A smashed taillight and rear bumper and a flat tire showed where the victims’ car slammed into back of Johnfinn’s last night around 10:23 p.m.

“When I came here, the car was on fire right in the middle of the road,” said Joseph Soares, who has lived in the neighborhood more than 20 years. “People were screaming because they saw the two dead bodies.”

A man who declined to give his name walked over to the scene this morning and stood over the spot where the car came to rest. He wept and placed his hand on the pavement — charred black from the fire — and said “rest in peace.”

“He was a good kid on the block,” the man said, referring to one victim he said was a close family friend. “It is hard for me to even speak about him, I’ve known him since he was in diapers.”

Officers responding to a report of shots fired in the area came upon the vehicle already engulfed by fire, police said. The two victims were pronounced dead at the scene at Eastman and Elder streets shortly after 10:20 p.m.

"It was later determined that the occupants had suffered gunshot wounds and had crashed the vehicle," police said in a statement released this morning.

Boston police are urging anyone with information about events leading up to the crash to call homicide detectives at 617-343-4470.

Meghan Ottolini and Laurel J. Sweet contributed to this report.