(CNN) — The 72-year-old man suspected of killing 10 people and injuring 10 others in a shooting at a dance studio en Monterey Park, Californiathis Saturday had previously frequented the establishment, sources told CNN.
The suspect, identified Like Huu Can Tran, he was pronounced dead following receiving a self-inflicted gunshot wound Sunday when police surrounded a white pickup truck in Torrance, regarding 30 miles from Monterey Park, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said.
The suspect was identified as Huu Can Tran.
The shooting at Star Ballroom Dance Studio occurred around 10:22 p.m. as the city’s large Asian-American community was celebrating Lunar New Year weekend. Between 17 and 20 minutes later, a gunman appeared at a second dance studio in nearby Alhambra, where authorities say a group of people seized a gun from him.
The mass shooting kicked off a region-wide manhunt, with a description of a white van seen leaving the Alhambra incident relayed to area law enforcement agencies. On Sunday morning, agents in Torrance saw a white pickup truck matching the description.
“When the officers got out of their patrol car to communicate with the occupant, they heard a shot coming from inside the truck,” Luna said. “Agents withdrew and requested multiple tactical teams to respond.” Then, when three armored vehicles blocked the truck, the SWAT team went up and found Tran dead inside, Luna said.
With it still unclear what prompted the shooting and a search warrant has been issued for Tran’s home, the sheriff said it’s too early to say if it might have been a hate crime and investigators are still working to determine if any of the victims was known to the attacker.
This is what we know regarding the suspect.
The suspect had been a regular customer at the ballroom
Police officers open the door of a pickup truck in Torrance on Sunday. (Robyn Beck/AFP/Getty Images)
Tran had been a regular attendee at Star Ballroom Dance Studio, his ex-wife and a long-time acquaintance told CNN.
Tran’s ex-wife, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the case, said she met Tran regarding two decades ago at the Star Ballroom, a popular community hangout where he gave informal lessons. Tran saw her at a dance, introduced himself and offered her free lessons, she said. The two married soon following, she said.
While Tran was never violent towards her, he said he might get angry quickly. For example, he told her, if she got a dance move wrong, he would get upset because he felt she was making him look bad. Tran filed for divorce in late 2005 and a judge approved the divorce the following year, Los Angeles court records show.
Tran was an immigrant from China, according to a copy of his marriage license his ex-wife showed CNN.
It was unclear how often, if at all, Tran visited the ballroom in recent years.
Another longtime acquaintance of Tran’s also remembered him as a frequent presence in the dance studio. The friend, who also asked not to be named, was around Tran in the late 2000s and early 2010s when he said Tran made the roughly five-minute drive from his San Gabriel home to Star Ballroom Dance Studio. “almost every night”.
Back then, Tran often complained that the ballroom instructors didn’t like him and said “bad things regarding him,” the friend recalled, adding that Tran was “hostile to a lot of people there.”
The friend said he hadn’t seen Tran in several years and was “totally shocked” when he found out regarding the shooting.
“I know a lot of people, and if they go to the Star studio, they frequent it,” he said, adding that he was “concerned that I might meet some” of the shooting victims.
Investigators are still reviewing Tran’s story, sheriff says
A crowd of onlookers watches as a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department helicopter takes off from Torrance. (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times/Getty images)
Luna told reporters Sunday that investigators are still reviewing Tran’s mental health and criminal history and following up on search warrants.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department obtained a search warrant for Tran’s home in a nursing home in Hemet, California, according to Hemet police public information agent Alan Reyes.
Records show Tran purchased a mobile home in the community, which is in a suburb regarding 80 miles east of Los Angeles in neighboring Riverside County.
Seven years before he bought the Hemet home, Tran sold a San Gabriel residence in 2013 that he had owned for more than two decades, property records show.
Business records also show that Tran registered a business called Tran’s Trucking Inc. in California in 2002. But he dissolved the business regarding two years later, writing in a corporate document that the company had never acquired any known assets or incurred any known debt or passive.
Tran had worked as a trucker at times, his ex-wife said.
The weapons that the authorities found
Authorities are still working to determine how the weapon allegedly used in the shooting was obtained.
The weapon recovered from the Alhambra location was a magazine-fed, semi-automatic assault pistol that had a high-capacity extended magazine attached, the sheriff said Sunday.
A law enforcement officer with knowledge of the case told CNN it was a 9mm Cobray M11 semi-automatic, which is designed to take 30-round magazines that allow rapid firing without having to frequently change magazines.
In response to a reporter’s question, Luna said: “I think it’s not legal to have the gun that was recovered from the Alhambra site here in the state of California.”
The gun was traced back to the suspect, giving authorities his name and description, according to the law enforcement officer.
A firearm was also discovered in the van with the suspect, the sheriff said.
CNN’s John Miller and Rebekah Riess contributed to this report.
