Parents Taken Hostage by Ranting, Machete-Wielding Son

A man wielding a machete tried to kill his parents after holding them hostage in their Simi Valley home Sunday morning, authorities said.

Michael Dasher, 40, of Simi Valley was being held Sunday in Ventura County Jail on attempted murder charges after allegedly taking his parents hostage and trying to kill them with a machete, according to a Police Department spokesman.

The parents suffered minor injuries and were treated at Simi Valley Hospital. A police officer suffered a facial injury but required no medical attention.

In addition to attempted murder, Dasher is being held on suspicion of inflicting bodily injury on a dependent adult, false imprisonment and possession of more than an ounce of marijuana, authorities said.

Bail is set at $250,000.

The bizarre incident began when Dasher, who lives with his parents on Lukens Lane, went to their bedroom about 6 a.m. wielding a machete and ranting on religious themes, said his father, James Dasher, 68.

They were held hostage about 90 minutes and made to justify their religious beliefs, Dasher said. About 7:20 a.m., Michael Dasher’s 54-year-old stepmother, Protasia, tried calling 911 “but he grabbed her by the hair and slammed her head against the headboard,” said the father, a retired aerospace worker. “He threw us around like rag dolls.” The phone was left off the hook and the 911 operator heard screaming and yelling, according to police.

The attacker then made his parents go to another room. He told them to kneel on the floor and begin praying.

“He had the machete to my neck,” James Dasher said. “He said, ‘Pray for your sins at the altar of death.’ I think if we would have finished that prayer it would have been the end of us.”

“At that part where I would have said ‘death’ that machete would have come down,” Dasher said.

Dasher said he and his wife distracted Michael and ran outside.

A neighbor who had heard their screams also called 911, and police arrived to find Michael Dasher in the house, a machete nearby.

When they tried to detain him he resisted, but was eventually taken into custody, his father said.

“It took five cops to take him down,” James Dasher said. He said he has no idea why his son tried to kill them.

“At times he would be very sensible, but then he would be intolerable,” Dasher said.

“He was fine until he started reading that religious stuff,” he said. An out-of-work construction plumber, Michael Dasher had lived with his father and stepmother on and off for about eight years, his father said. He was married at one time but is now divorced.

Dasher knows of no mental illness in his son’s background, but said he does have a history of drug use. At the time of his arrest, Michael Dasher was on probation for prior, unspecified narcotics violations, according to police.

James Dasher said he hopes to prosecute his son to the “fullest extent of the law.”

“It’s sad for a father to slam the door on a kid, but I think it’s about time to do that,” Dasher said.