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The suspect in a shooting in Los Angeles which killed 10 people and left another 10 wounded has been found dead by police.

He shot himself inside a white van that officers had surrounded.

He has been identified as a 72 year old man of asian descent.

Saturday's mass shooting took place at a dance venue in Monterey park during lunar new Year celebrations.

David Willis reports from L.

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Officers called to a suburb in eastern L.

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Described a scene of carnage, a ballroom dancing venue for elderly members of the local asian american community shot up on the eve of the lunar new year.

Five men and five women were pronounced dead at the scene, 10 others were injured.

The suspect has been named as 72 year old who can tran police believe he was planning a similar attack at a dance studio in the neighboring city of Alhambra before bystanders overpowered him and wrestled a firearm from his grasp, acting on reports of a white van that he was thought to be driving.

Officers pulling up behind the vehicle heard a single gunshot ring out.

They found the suspect slumped across the steering wheel dead from a self inflicted gunshot wound.

Detectives also recovered a handgun and other evidence linking him to the massacre.

Los Angeles is home to one of the largest asian american communities in this country.

The banners and red lanterns that marked the start of the year of the rabbit, all part of lunar new year celebrations that traditionally herald the hope of renewed good fortune and prosperity.

Gun violence needs to stop.

There's too much of it.

We're all standing here tonight because an individual uh, took a weapon and did the damage that we've talked about without repeating it.

I think all of us, uh, need to take some ownership there.

I think we really need to go back and look at what we do.

President biden called the attack senseless and ordered a lowering of flags on federal buildings in memory of those who died last year in the wake of a school massacre in texas, He signed into law the first major gun safety legislation this country has seen in nearly 30 years, but at the time, he said it wasn't enough.

The massacre in Monterey Park is the fifth mass shooting in the United States this year.

Well, we can talk to David now live from L.

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David.

Hello to you very late on sunday evening.

What are the people, what's the latest that police are saying about the investigation?

Well, as well as naming the suspect in this case, Karen and making the point that this man is thought to have taken his own life as police moved in on him and the white van that he was known to be traveling in.

They have also said that after this massacre in the suburb of Monterrey Park, this man is thought to have then gone on to a neighboring suburb that of old Kadena and their attempted to gain entry to another ballroom dance venue only to be apprehended by passersby there who confiscated the weapon that he was carrying.

The local sheriff here has called those people heroes and has said that were it not for their timely intervention, this man could have killed a lot more people.

There are also, I might add unconfirmed reports that this man used to teach at the ballroom dance center, which he shot up and that this may rather bizarrely all have been about some sort of jealousy on the eve of the lunar new year and David, the suburb of L.

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Where this took place, Monterey Park really not used to this sort of event.

Absolutely.

It's a gentile area.

Karen, it's home to the bulk of the asian american community in this city and indeed is one of the largest centers of the asian american population in the United States.

They've never had violence of this kind in that area and it has taken a lot of people by shock.

There.

They are reeling from this and a lot of people of course are still wondering what's happened to their relatives.

There are at least seven people still in hospital and the conditions of some of them still unknown at this time.

President biden has said that this is a senseless massacre.

He's ordered flags on federal buildings to be lowered to half staff and it was, he of course who put through the first changes to the gun control laws here In Congress in almost 30 years.

They included wider background checks.

But he himself said at the time that those measures don't go far enough, and the L.

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sheriff agreed with that tonight, saying basically that the status quo, as far as gun control laws in this country is concerned, is really not enough.

David, thank you very much, David Willis in Los Angeles.