Neighbors React to Mass Murder

In the community off Walnut Park Lane, near Goleta people are shocked to hear the news that four people were brutally attacked just down the street.

“The neighborhood was very quiet. In fact I have been thinking lately about how safe and quiet this neighborhood is,” said Anola Dohrman, a neighbor that lives down the street.

“It’s a friendly neighborhood. I am surprised that it happened,” said Terra, a neighbor to the victims.

Dohrman says, she was awoken by her daughter in the middle of the night as several emergency vehicles rolled down their block.

“She got me up quickly she saw, police men with guns and she said some of them had rifles. They were kind of all over the place,” said Dohrman.

A few hours later, neighbors saw body bag, after body bag being carried out of the house.

The Sheriff’s Department confirmed there were four bodies and a dog removed from the home, and that the alleged killer was Nichloas Holzer. Sheriff Bill Brown said, the victims are Holzer elderly parents and two children. They were all stabbed to death late Monday night, before Holzer called police and turned himself in.

Neighbors told NewsChannel 3 the house was normally quiet and the only person they regularly saw leaving the house was the elderly father of the murder suspect.

“He was always a gentleman. Quiet living, like a financially comfortable older person. Everything just looked so normal,” said Dohrman.

The two children, who were killed in the attack would have been starting school in just a couple weeks. The Santa Barbara and Goleta school districts will have grief counselors available for those who need it.