Suspect in five Arizona killings apparently kills self
Aug 30th, 2010 by Bilal Ali
A man suspected in the shooting deaths of five people at a Lake Havasu City, Arizona, residence on Saturday night was found dead early Sunday of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to police.
The killings began just before midnight Saturday when police say 26-year-old Brian Diez entered the residence, shot six people and abducted two children from the home, according to a press release from the Lake Havasu City Police Department.
Four of the victims were pronounced dead. Two others were transported to local hospitals, where one of them died of his injuries.
According to an Amber Alert issued Sunday for the missing children, Diez, their father, was locked in a custody battle with their mother, identified by police as 23-year-old Deborah Langstaff. Langstaff was among the five people killed.
A little more than three hours after the shootings, Lake Havasu police investigators discovered that Diez’s vehicle was parked at a home in Rancho Cucamonga, California, more than 250 miles away from the site of the killings. At about the same time, local sheriff’s deputies were dispatched to the same residence, responding to a report of a suicide.
“Deputies arrived and found Diez deceased of an apparent self-inflicted gun shot wound,” police said in a statement.
The two children, identified by police as 4-year-old Kaia Diez and 13-month-old Cole Diez, were found safe at the California home with family members.
Police said the five people killed in Arizona were: Langstaff, Primo Verdone, 24, Russell Nyland, 42, Ashley Nyland, 20, and Brock Kelson, 20.
Deborah Nyland, 44, was transported to Sunrise Medical Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. Her condition was unknown Sunday night.
The relationship between the victims was not immediately clear