Former Child Actor Killed in Standoff
LUI: You know, quite a shock for Dallas police to realize here their suspect in a fatal shooting spree used to be on their side of the law. Brian Smith was a Utah state trooper until his resignation earlier this year. He's in critical condition today after shooting himself in the head during a standoff with police. Cops say ballistics evidence linked Smith to at least one of two rush-hour murders on Monday.</s>LT. CRAIG MILLER, DALLAS POLICE HOMICIDE UNIT: At this time we don't feel there's a threat and that people don't need to be concerned about being on the freeways, and it's safe to be out and about as you're doing your Christmas shopping.</s>LUI: Now, according to Texas and Utah police, Smith became addicted to painkillers after an accident on the job. California police have released the name of the man killed in a standoff near Los Angeles yesterday. Thirty-eight-year-old Manuel Benitez was a former child actor who went by the name Mark Everett. He was wanted in connection with the killing of his girlfriend four years ago. KCAL's Suzie Suh has more on the hostage ordeal.</s>LT. LIAM GALLAGHER, LOS ANGELES COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT: The suspect claimed that he was going to shoot it out with the police, claimed he was going to kill the child, harm the child.</s>SUZIE SUH, KCAL REPORTER (voice-over): In the middle of a busy shopping plaza, a hostage situation shut down streets, evacuated businesses.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We closed the doors.</s>SUH: And stunned witnesses.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was kind of scary. Because, you know, everybody with guns and everything.</s>SUH: Police responded to a report of a suspicious person who appeared to be a transient walking with a little boy on an El Monte sidewalk.</s>GALLAGHER: He produced a handgun. He moved the child that he had in his hand, was holding by the hand, between himself and the officers.</s>SUH: The man reportedly took the 6-year-old boy into the Tai Pan Chinese restaurant and barricade himself in the bathroom.</s>GALLAGHER: He had a semiautomatic pistol and a revolver.</s>SUH: After two hours of trying to negotiate with the man...</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There was a couple of bangs.</s>SUH: ... a SWAT team went in to rescue the boy.</s>GALLAGHER: There was an exchange of gunfire. The suspect was hit and killed at the scene.</s>SUH: The boy was also hit. It's unclear if he was wounded from the man's gun or police gunfire.</s>LUI: Police say the boy, Benitez's son here, is expected to recover. Authorities also are looking for his mother. That's Elizabeth Velasco. Santa knows it already, and he's got lumps of coal with their names on them. He knows these folks. But do you know who has been naughty and who has been really naughty this year in politics?