‘I don’t know if I’m good’: Metro releases final report on Summerlin law office shooting

Las Vegas police found no evidence that attorney Joseph Houston told anyone of his plans to shoot and kill his former daughter-in-law and her new husband at a Summerlin law office last year, according to a final homicide report released Thursday.

Instead, police found a handwritten note with Houston’s belongings at the scene of the shooting that read: “In this life there is good and EVIL — I don’t know if I’m good — But I know you’re evil — Dylan is a great dad — When are you going to stop trying to take (redacted) away from him? When are you going to stop HARASSING the Houston family?” according to the report.

Houston, 77, shot and killed Ashley Prince, 30, and her husband, Las Vegas attorney Dennis Prince, 57, during a deposition in a contentious custody battle between Ashley Prince and Joseph Houston’s son, Dylan Houston. Dennis Prince was representing his wife, while Joseph Houston, who also went by Joe Houston, was representing his son, who is also an attorney.

“Through the course of the investigation, it was determined Joseph acted alone, and no parties involved had any knowledge that Joseph was going to kill Ashley and Dennis Prince,” police wrote at the end of the report.

The child custody battle started as divorce proceedings between Dylan Houston and Ashley Prince. Throughout the case, Ashley Prince and her lawyers accused Dylan Houston of engaging in threatening behavior and substance abuse, while he accused his ex-wife of vindictive tactics and an unwillingness to co-parent with him, according to court records.

Records show that the case became contentious and stretched on as attorneys represented their own family members.

Confrontation before deposition

The April 8, 2024, deposition was held at Dennis Prince’s law office and was scheduled so Dennis Prince could question Joe Houston’s wife, Katherine Houston.

The handwritten note was found in Joe Houston’s briefcase at Dennis Prince’s law office after the shooting, according to the report. The briefcase contained another handwritten note with what appeared to be talking points for the deposition.

Attorneys began arriving at the law office around 9:50 that morning. At the beginning of the meeting, Joe Houston briefly confronted Dennis Prince, according to a transcript of a recording of the deposition included in the report.

“Before we start, are you guys ever going to stop trying to take the kids away from Dylan?” Joe Houston asked.

Instead of answering, Dennis Prince just said, “OK, we’re ready,” and moved forward with the deposition.

Dennis Prince began asking Katherine Houston questions, some of which were redacted from the report. He began asking if Ashley Prince would “complain” to Katherine Houston during her marriage, and Katherine Houston began to answer the question before he finished the sentence.

“Hang on, let me finish my question,” Dennis Prince said.

Joe Houston opened fire seconds later, a little over a minute after the questioning began, the report said.

Houston fired 11 gunshots in the room over the course of about two minutes. According to the transcript included in the report, police sirens could be heard in the distance before Joe Houston turned the gun on himself, less than 10 minutes after the shooting began.

Son ruled out as suspect

Dylan Houston told police that he had no knowledge of his father’s plans. He said he spent that morning taking his children to school and placing a bet at a casino.

Police found surveillance footage that backed up Dylan Houston’s alibi, according to the report.

Officers also spoke to a bartender at a restaurant who had a text from Dylan Houston stating that he wanted to eat breakfast with her that morning before he realized she was off work. Surveillance footage showed Dylan Houston entering the restaurant and leaving just before 10:15 that morning, as the shooting was happening.

The Metropolitan Police Department announced in July 2024 that Dylan Houston was not a suspect in the homicide investigation.

Police interviewed multiple employees who worked for Dennis Prince’s law firm, and at least three of the employees said they were aware of contentious communications between Dennis Prince and Joe Houston.

Another attorney at the firm told police that Dennis Prince played for him a voicemail from Joe Houston. The attorney said Joe Houston sounded “apparently drunk and not threatening but menacing in his tone” in the voicemail, while he was discussing a “specific child custody exchange,” according to the report.

A legal assistant at Dennis Prince’s firm told police she was familiar with multiple angry emails and phone calls made to Dennis Prince, but that she did not know of “any particular threats,” the report said. She also told police that a deposition meeting in October 2023 had ended quickly “due to a heated disagreement.”

‘Take it down a notch’

Attorney Lisa Rasmussen, who was representing Katherine Houston in the child custody case, told police that she planned to speak to Dennis Prince before the deposition, to tell him to “take it down a notch,” but that “he ignored her request,” according to the report.

Rasmussen told the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Thursday that she had emailed Dennis Prince the month prior, asking to speak one-on-one about the case, but that he did not respond to her message. She said she wanted to talk to him because the litigation was getting heated between the parties, who were all family members.

“To me it seemed out of the ordinary and overboard,” Rasmussen said about the case. “I would call it more overboard than contentious.”

Police executing a search warrant after the shooting found multiple piles of documents related to the child custody case throughout Joe Houston’s home. Joe Houston had left a note with his phone password and a note for his son reminding him to make payments to a homeowners association, the report said.

Officers also found Joe Houston’s medical paperwork from the month prior. The paperwork indicated a “procedure was authorized,” but police redacted information in the report about the procedure.

Many parts of Metro’s report were redacted, with police citing redactions for privacy reasons and medical information.

The Review-Journal has previously reported that Joe Houston had told one of his colleagues his cancer had returned, more than a year after he underwent chemotherapy for prostate cancer that had spread to his bones.

On the day of the shooting, police interviewed Dylan Houston with his attorney present. Dylan Houston confirmed his father had previously been diagnosed with a disease, the specifics of which were redacted from the report.

“Dylan was unaware of any terminal diagnosis for Joseph and implied he believed Joseph had not received any doctor’s opinion of a finite amount of time to live,” police wrote in the report.

In February, Ashley Prince’s parents, Paul and Julie Page, filed multiple wrongful death lawsuits over their daughter’s killing. The defendants named were Katherine Houston and Joe Houston’s estate, with his former law firm and business.

One lawsuit, which is still being litigated, alleged that Katherine Houston had knowledge that Joe Houston planned to shoot Ashley Prince during the deposition. Katherine Houston’s attorney filed an answer to the lawsuit in March, denying the allegations and writing that any injuries suffered by the plaintiffs were caused by “a third party over which Defendant had no control,” according to court records.

Contact Katelyn Newberg at knewberg@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0240.