Long Beach hotel cook pleads no contest to workplace shooting threat

LONG BEACH - A Southern California hotel cook who threatened to shoot up his workplace and kept an arsenal at his home has pleaded no contest to making criminal threats.

Thirty-seven-year-old Rodolfo Montoya entered pleas Monday to two felony counts and could face up to three years and eight months in prison.

Police said Montoya,who worked at the Long Beach Marriott, was angry over a workplace issue and in August told a co-worker he was going to shoot other colleagues and people at the hotel. The co-worker notified management, who called police.

At Montoya's home, investigators found a Colt AR-15 rifle, a shotgun, pistols and other rifles, tactical gear and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, prosecutors said.

Montoya had “clear plans, intent and the means to carry out an act of violence,”Long Beach Police Chief Robert Luna said at the time.