“Person of interest” in the murder of Ronni Chasen shoots himself

Police said the man was a person of interest and not a suspect.

“This was not a guy we were going to arrest, we only wanted to question him,” Lt. Tony Lee of the Beverly Hills Police Department tells PEOPLE.

The police visited his home on Wednesday night with a search warrant. His neighbors knew him by the name of Harold. Police officers told him to raise his hands but he refused, and he immediately whipped out a gun and shot himself in the head. The cops didn’t have time to talk to him before the fatal act. He was dead before being taken to hospital.

This man had reportedly told one of his neighbors that he “offed her” and got paid for it. The man had already been in prison for possession of drugs and vowed that he would never go to prison again.

“He told me several times, ‘If it ever came back down to me going to prison, I would die first,’” his neighbor said.

Ronni Chasen handled the promotion of great American films and of several actors in particular. She was killed in Hollywood while driving her Mercedes-Benz after leaving an afterparty for the Burlesque premiere on November 16. Her body was found riddled with bullets in her car after hitting a light pole.