Overview
- Officers, called to the Westminster Place home Saturday after a 911 report of a man with a hatchet, found 34-year-old Christopher Jaber dead inside a small backyard unit known as an accessory dwelling unit.
- Police arrested 35-year-old David Swank Prince walking nearby, and prosecutors have charged him with murder with a deadly-weapon enhancement tied to a hatchet; he is being held at the Martinez jail on $1 million bail and is set for arraignment Wednesday.
- Authorities say the killing appears targeted, and they are still investigating a motive and whether Prince and Jaber knew each other.
- Multiple outlets report that a Facebook account bearing Prince’s name named Jaber, listed his address, and a week before the killing said, “Can someone please kill this man,” which investigators are reviewing.
- Lafayette residents, unused to lethal violence in a city with no homicides recorded from 2013 through 2025, are asking why explicit online threats were not flagged sooner.