A 47-year-old man who exchanged gunfire with police at a Woodland Hills motel over the weekend was armed with an air rifle and a double-barrel air pistol, both of which were capable of firing “metallic rounds of ammunition,” authorities said Tuesday, Dec. 31.
Officers responded to the Vantage Pointe Inn, in the 21700 block of Ventura Boulevard, about 10:15 p.m. Sunday on a report of vandalism and found a man walking in the driveway toward the street, police said. The man, identified by the medical examiner’s office as Benjamin Prince, pulled what appeared to be two firearms and fired at officers, who returned fire.
Prince retreated toward a parked vehicle, but returned with one firearm and fired a second time at the officers, who again returned fire, police said.
Prince ran back into the motel and officers requested SWAT and K9 units, police said. SWAT officers later entered the motel and found Prince at the bottom of a stairwell with multiple gunshot wounds.
When reached by phone, police declined to say whether the weapons Prince fired were capable of shooting bullets or pellets. The air pistol was found with an air cartridge in each barrel, while the air rifle was found loaded with seven rounds in the cylinder, police said.
Saul Arellano, who was staying at the motel that night, said he heard someone breaking windows and later saw a man clad only in a towel who at one point said “The end is here.”
The man later pointed a weapon at a passerby on a skateboard and fired, Arellano said. Police arrived soon after and Arellano said Prince fired at officers first.
How many officers fired at Prince was not disclosed.
