California man with violent past, air rifles slings threats at hotel
A California man with a history of threatening behavior was arrested last Thursday at the Best Western Hotel in Fillmore after he told a hotel worker he was in the city to “kill the Mormons.”
Lawrence Frassoldati
Lawrence Frassoldati, 58, also told the frightened hotel worker he worked for the CIA, killed Osama bin Laden and would in fact kill her.
When police responded to the chaotic scene—another witness told police he saw the suspect with a rifle slung over his shoulder, threatening to kill everyone in the hotel— Frassoldati, marijuana pipe in hand, allegedly proceeded to threaten deputies who attempted to calm him down. Eventually the suspect approached deputies with fists in the air in an “aggressive manner” and earned himself an electric shock from a Taser.
Frassoldati managed to kick one of the deputies on his way down to the ground, according to a probable cause statement filed with Fourth District Court. And when another deputy attempted to cuff the suspect, Frassol- dati started choking and scratching at the offi cer’s neck.
“The suspect grabbed me around the throat in an attempt to choke me,” the deputy wrote in his arrest report. “During the incident his fingernails dug into the skin on my neck scratching me causing me to bleed. I have marks on my neck on both sides from where he grabbed me. When we got him into hand restraints and assisted him to his feet he told me that he could have killed me when he tried to choke me.”
After his arrest, police obtained search warrants for Frassoldati’s hotel room and vehicle, court records show.
Inside the room, police found suspected marijuana as well as a .357 caliber air-powered rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition for a .22 caliber air rifle. Inside the man’s vehicle, police discovered more suspected marijuana and a .22 caliber air rifle along with 250 rounds of ammunition for a .357 caliber air rifle.
Air rifles, unlike the popular Airsoft guns that shoot plastic pellets, actually fire projectiles with potentially deadly effect, said Sheriff Richard Jacobson, who was asked about the incident. Some people even hunt deer with air rifles, he said. Projectiles fired from these guns can reach top speeds of hundreds of feet per second.
In 2013, an Indiana teen faced a reckless homicide charge after shooting a 45-year-old with an air rifle during a prank. The older man died of a chest wound.
Frassoldati now faces a slew of criminal charges, including multiple counts of second-degree felony assault on a peace officer, second-degree felony threat of terrorism, third-degree felony disarming a police officer and a multitude of Class A and B misdemeanors for drug possession, dangerous weapon by a restricted person, assault, interference with arresting officer and other counts.
Frassoldati has been in trouble before, even earning a zap from a Taser at a Hyatt hotel in 2014 in Carmel, Calif., according to contemporaneous news reports. He told hotel staff even then he’d killed Osama bin Laden, according to a report filed by KSBW Action News 8.
A cursory search for other records showed a felony criminal conviction against the suspect in a case filed in Santa Barbara County, Calif. in 2000. No other details about that case were available, though in Frassoldati’s latest arrest, deputies wrote that he had “a substantial criminal history of violent charges.”
The suspect was being held without bail at the Millard County Jail as of Monday.
An initial court appearance for Frassoldati was scheduled for Wednesday, May 5.
