The Los Angeles Police Department is asking for the public’s help finding a man suspected of stabbing both of his parents at their Woodland Hills home, according to law enforcement officials.

LAPD officers responded to a call in the Woodland Hills neighborhood in the western San Fernando Valley after the couple was found with stab wounds. Both victims were transported to a local hospital. The suspect, described as the couple’s son, fled the scene before officers arrived and remained at large as of April 9.

Not great for a neighborhood that’s seen its share of crime-adjacent headlines lately.

The department has not released the names of the victims or the suspect pending further investigation, but detectives are treating this as a targeted domestic violence incident rather than a random attack. LAPD is asking anyone with information about the suspect’s whereabouts to contact them directly.

Domestic violence calls are among the most dangerous for responding officers, and cases where a suspect flees after an attack on family members carry a particular urgency. The victims’ conditions had not been publicly confirmed as of Thursday morning.

So what does this have to do with cannabis?

The Woodland Hills community sits within a part of Los Angeles that has seen repeated overlap between domestic disputes and properties connected to unlicensed cannabis operations. Law enforcement sources have told California Bud over the past year that domestic calls to addresses flagged in DCC databases, or adjacent to known unlicensed grows, sometimes mask deeper conflicts rooted in cash-heavy, unregulated business arrangements. That’s not a claim being made about this specific incident. But the pattern is real, and it’s why community reporters who cover cannabis enforcement pay attention when serious violence breaks out in residential corridors where gray-market activity has been documented.

The San Fernando Valley, including areas like Woodland Hills, Canoga Park, and West Hills, has been the subject of multiple Department of Cannabis Control enforcement sweeps targeting unlicensed retail and delivery operations operating out of private residences. The DCC, which [oversees all cannabis licensing in California](https://www.dca.ca.gov/consumers/cannabis.shtml), has broad authority to refer cases to local law enforcement when residential addresses come up repeatedly in complaints.

None of that changes the core fact here. A couple was stabbed, allegedly by their own son. That’s the story.

LAPD’s Valley Bureau handles the Woodland Hills area, and detectives from the bureau’s major crimes unit are leading the investigation. The department has not said whether the suspect has a prior criminal history or whether there’s a known motive beyond the domestic relationship itself.

According to LA Times reporting on the incident, LAPD is actively seeking the public’s help in locating the suspect and has asked anyone with information to come forward.

Witnesses or anyone who believes they’ve seen the suspect should contact LAPD directly. The department has not released a physical description of the suspect in publicly available information as of this writing, which may change as the investigation develops.

Woodland Hills residents have been shaken. A stabbing of this nature, a son allegedly turning on his own parents inside a family home, cuts differently than street crime. Neighbors process it differently. It raises questions that don’t resolve quickly.

Still, the immediate focus for LAPD is finding the suspect before anyone else gets hurt. A suspect who has already shown willingness to use a blade against family members is considered dangerous, and detectives typically escalate public outreach fast in cases like this.

California Bud will continue to monitor this case for any connections to cannabis-related activity as more details emerge from LAPD and the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office. If law enforcement confirms any link between this incident and unlicensed cannabis operations in the area, we’ll report it. If they don’t, that matters too.

Anyone with information is urged to contact LAPD’s Valley Bureau or the department’s tip line at 1-877-LAPD-24-7. Tips can be submitted anonymously.