Naked Intruder Shot Dead After Bursting Into Reseda House

A naked man who broke into four Reseda homes and terrorized residents Friday night was shot and killed by a homeowner whose wife he threatened, police said Saturday.

Gene Brian Holloway, 23, smashed his head and hands through several windows during the 11 p.m. rampage, police said. Holloway, who lived about a mile away from the neighborhood, had been unemployed for the last year after a five-year stint in the Army. None of the people he terrorized knew him, police said.

An autopsy will be performed to determine whether Holloway was under the influence of drugs.

Los Angeles police officers were investigating several reports of an intruder in the 6800 block of Lasaine Avenue when they responded to a “shots fired” call at a home on the street. Officers found the owner, James E. Bruner, 38, standing outside the home. He took them to the living room, where police found Holloway’s body.

Bruner told police he was home with his wife, Elizabeth, 38, and their 17-year-old daughter when he heard a noise in the back yard. He went to investigate and was confronted by a naked man covered with blood. The two men fought briefly before Bruner broke away and ran back into his house, locking a sliding glass door behind him.

Bruner “directed his family to call police while he armed himself” with a shotgun, Officer Tom Zwinger said.

Holloway then threw himself through the glass door and “charged” Elizabeth Bruner, Zwinger said. Bruner fired twice at Holloway, killing him, Zwinger said.

Bruner, who suffered cuts and bruises during his fight with Holloway, was questioned and released.

Police said the Bruner house was Holloway’s last stop on a rampage through the neighborhood.

Residents at one house told police that an intruder shoved his head through a closed bathroom window and began yelling. At a second house, a man smashed his hand through a window in a front door, unlocked the door and confronted a woman before throwing himself through a front window.

A bedroom window at a third house was smashed, but Holloway did not enter. He instead went to the back yard and took off his clothes before going to the Bruner house.