Police last week arrested an 81-year-old Southern California man whom they described as a “serial slingshot shooter” believed to have been victimizing his neighbors for about a decade.
Azusa police said they responded to a “quality of life issue” in the 900 block of North Enid Avenue and learned that over the last nine to 10 years, “dozens of citizens were being victimized by a serial slingshot shooter.”
The man broke windows and windshields with his weapon and at times almost hit people, police said. Inmate records indicate that the suspect, Prince King, is 81 years old. Police didn’t list an attorney who could comment on his behalf.
Police served a search warrant at the neighborhood where the slingshot attacks were happening Thursday and ultimately arrested King. Police said ball bearings and a slingshot were found at his home.
Azusa police Lt. Jake Bushey told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune that police began investigating after the first slingshot incident but hadn’t been able to pin down a suspect until now. Bushey said Saturday that he wasn’t sure how King was ultimately identified but that detectives learned most of the ball bearings were coming from King’s backyard or “a nearby neighborhood.”
Police haven’t identified a motive “other than just malicious mischief,” Bushey said, according to the Tribune.
Bushey added that the shots weren’t random, although he didn’t know why certain people or properties were targets, the newspaper reported.
Some commenters on the police department’s Facebook post said that windows of their cars had been shot out but that they couldn’t be sure King was the culprit.
King’s next court date is scheduled for Tuesday.
