This is the wife of the Las Vegas lawyer who was shot dead along with her husband during a custody hearing by her former father-in-law.
Dennis Prince, 57, and Ashley Prince, 30, were fatally shot Monday morning during a deposition involving Ashley’s ex-husband, Dylan Houston. Prince represented his wife in the case.
Dylan was represented by his cancer-stricken father, 77-year-old Joseph Houston II, who opened fire during the procedure before turning the gun on himself.
Ashley seemed concerned about her safety before Monday’s deadly statement, asking a private investigator about private security, as reported by 8 News Now.
“Dylan has a lot of guns in that house,” she texted. ‘[I don’t know] if Dylan will be there, but just in case he is.”
Dennis Prince, 57, and Ashley Prince, 30, were fatally shot during a deposition involving Ashley’s ex-husband.
Joseph Houston, who turned the gun on himself, is pictured with his daughter
Gunshots rang out at Prince Law Group’s Summerlin office around 10 a.m. Monday
Ashley canceled the bond after learning that Dylan would not be present for the deposition.
Just five days before the shooting, Dylan – also a lawyer – had sent Dennis an email saying, “You have no idea what’s going to happen, all your cards are on the table and I haven’t played any of them yet. [laughing emoji].’
Dylan apparently referred to a surveillance report that did not portray Dennis in a positive light, according to a source with knowledge of the custody battle.
Court records seen by 8 News Now show Dylan was accused of testing positive for cocaine and alcohol while with the children.
The report says Dylan drank excessively on March 29, consuming five drinks with three shots in about four hours. Dylan then got behind the wheel of his vehicle and swerved onto the road.
According to court records, Dylan was required to take a breathalyzer test before seeing the children.
On Monday, a judge ordered that Ashley’s sister get temporary custody of the two children instead of Dylan.
Prince represented his wife in an ongoing custody case involving her ex-husband, Houston’s son Dylan
‘[P]Connecting the parties’ minor children to the plaintiff would be harmful to the children, and awarding custody to a non-parent is required to serve the best interests of the children based on the recent actions of the father of the plaintiff and the plaintiff,” wrote Clark County District Court Judge. Bill Henderson.
Gunfire broke out at Prince Law Group’s Summerlin office around 10 a.m., according to Clark County Sheriff Kevin McMahill.
Robert Eglet, a Las Vegas litigator and close friend of Prince’s for decades, revealed in an interview with Fox News Digital that Houston had confided just days earlier that he was dying of cancer.
“Joe told me not long before the shooting that he was dying of terminal cancer. I wonder if he felt like he had nothing to lose?’ Hedgehog said.
“But I really don’t know, I can’t make sense of it.”
Court documents filed hours later detail the moments leading up to the senseless violence.
Five minutes after the deposition began, Houston “stood up, had a very glassy and rattled look in his eyes, pulled out a gun and shot Prince four times,” the documents said.
As the shots rang out, Houston appeared to take note of a pregnant lawyer who was in the room — and spare her life.
The woman, identified as Shannon Wilson, “immediately ducked and hid under the table in the conference room.”
According to a close friend of Prince’s, Houston had confided just days before the shooting that he was dying of terminal cancer
Before Prince turned the gun on himself, it appeared he spared the life of a pregnant lawyer who begged him not to hurt her baby.
Michele LoBello, another attorney for Ashley Prince, claimed Wilson begged the shooter not to hurt her baby.
“She explained to me that Mr. Houston allowed her to leave the conference room and after she quickly left and took cover elsewhere in the office, she heard more shots fired,” LoBello said.
Dylan, a partner at Resnick & Louis in Las Vegas, filed for divorce from Ashley in October 2021 after four years of marriage.
According to social media posts, the couple were together for several years before getting married, with Ashley announcing that she and Dylan were moving in together in 2014.
She was identified in court filings last month as Ashley Prince.
A divorce decree issued in November 2021 granted the couple joint custody of their children, a son and daughter aged 5 and 4, but this remained in dispute.
Records show that Dylan was arrested in October 2020 on a DUI charge, but later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of reckless driving.
Following his no contest plea in February 2022, Dylan was ordered to complete community service and DUI classes.
Records also show that he would send abusive text messages to Ashley, who had filed for sole custody of the couple’s children on the morning of the shooting.
Within hours of her death, Ashley’s lawyers filed an emergency motion asking that sole custody of the children be given to her sister. The motion was granted.
In that document, LoBello claimed that Dylan “was or must have been aware of his father’s intentions prior to committing these heinous acts.”
She cited an attempt to pick up his children “in the middle of the school day, despite details of (Ashley’s) dead or alive status not being made public at this time.”
Dylan responded in response to the accusations.
“The motivation for the April 8, 2024 tragedy is unknown to anyone other than Joseph W. Houston himself. “The defense’s suggestion that this was a ‘planned attack’ on the prosecution is insulting and quite speculative,” he wrote.
Dennis Prince, 57, and wife Ashley Prince, 30, were killed Monday morning in a shooting at his law office by another attorney, 77-year-old Joseph Houston II.
He claimed his actions were “not indicative of a co-conspirator, as the defense callously wants the Court to believe, but rather of a concerned father who wants to protect, comfort, love and support his children from any unnecessary discussion of this tragedy.” . .
According to a biography on the law firm’s website, Prince was the founding member and lead trial attorney on all major cases.
He was recognized by the Nevada Justice Association as the Nevada Trial Lawyer of the Year in 2016 and was trying more than 100 cases to jury verdict at the time of his death.
He and Ashley had also recently welcomed a child together.
The advocacy group released a statement hours after the killings, thanking “everyone who has contacted us with heartfelt messages of concern and condolences regarding the tragic violence that occurred in our offices this morning.”
The Houston family released their own statement through a public relations firm on Tuesday.
“Our family is in a state of deep shock and sadness over yesterday’s events. We ask for prayers and privacy as we try to navigate the coming days,” it said.
“The Las Vegas Police Department is still investigating and while that continues, speculation about the details of the incident only adds further trauma to our already grieving and overwhelmed families.
“We have the utmost confidence in Metro’s efforts and will leave all future comments to them as their investigation unfolds.”