Gun dealers look to buy arsenal of weapons found at Pacific Palisades home

A dead man’s arsenal of weapons discovered inside a Pacific Palisades home is now drawing the interest of gun dealers who are looking to buy some of his stash, an attorney said Thursday.

Harland Braun, who is representing Jeffrey Alan Lash’s fiancee, said he received calls from gun dealers interested in purchasing the now roughly 1,500 firearms -- most of which of were in mint condition -- found stored in the Palisades Drive home.

But Braun quelled any interest in the firearms, saying he advised the gun dealers that they weren’t for sale yet because Los Angeles police were still running background checks on the weapons.

The 6.5 tons of ammunition recovered from the home will likely be destroyed by law enforcement, he said.

Braun’s private investigator is working to catalogue and locate other collections contained in storage lockers throughout the city.

The lockers, he said, may hold military-type vehicles, including a possible amphibious vehicle that travels by land and water.

However, Braun said there is no way of knowing what is inside the lockers until they find them. Lash’s fiancee, Catherine Nebron, didn’t know much about the collections, he said.

“It’s a mystery,� Braun said. “He didn’t clue her into everything he was doing.�

Inside the home, Braun found machetes, bows and arrows, hundreds of CDs and scores of tools. Investigators also found $230,000 in cash.

Los Angeles Police Department Capt. William Hayes, who heads the department’s Robbery-Homicide Division, said the private gun collection was worth at least $500,000 and possibly more than $1 million. Police don’t believe the man ever sold weapons or was a licensed firearms dealer. Police said he was a collector.

Police discovered the man’s body Friday, and later found the massive firearm and ammunition supply inside his fiancee’s Pacific Palisades home.

Braun and several law enforcement sources have identified the dead man as Lash. The L.A. County coroner’s office has not officially identified him but is looking for his relatives.

Lash was mysterious, even to people who were close to him.

Braun said he told his fiancee and others that he was working in an undercover capacity for a government agency and was being watched.

She so believed he was under surveillance that when he died, she figured the unnamed government agency he had claimed to work for would come to collect his body.

On July 4, Lash, who suffered from late-stage cancer, began experiencing health issues and died in a Bristol Farms parking lot in Santa Monica, Braun said.

His fiancee, he said, wasn’t sure what to do with the body and left it in a vehicle on Palisades Drive while she headed to Oregon.

Nebron apparently headed to Oregon with Dawn VadBunker, a 39-year-old Oxnard resident whose parents reported her missing when she disappeared after July 4.

VadBunker managed several properties owned by Nebron. VadBunker believed Lash was a part human and part alien hybrid, said her father David VadBunker.

She often talked about Lash, who told people his name was Bob. Dawn VadBunker told her father that the man was “so secret� and that he “is going to save the world.�

David VadBunker said his daughter was with Nebron when the man died.

It is unclear why Dawn VadBunker and Nebron went to Oregon. Dawn VadBunker, her father said, had no ties to Oregon. After she disappeared, her parents went on local TV news, hoping to find her.

She was finally located outside a motel in Deschutes County, Ore. Oxnard police said she expressed deep regret for all the worry she caused.

Her parents, however, still have not talked to their daughter. They said they received a letter on July 16 with no return address that said she was safe.

Her father said she asked for time to heal, and that Nebron also needed time to grieve over Lash’s death and wanted to be left alone.

For breaking news in California, follow @VeronicaRochaLA on Twitter.

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