Neighbors Speak Out About Discovery Gunman James Lee

WHEATON, Md. - One day after the madness and his death, we're learning that James Lee was an angry loner with a long-standing hatred for the Discovery Channel who was not afraid to kill his hostages.

"I'm sure it was terrifying for those three men that were there because they were listening to what he was saying," Montgomery County States Attorney John McCarthy said. "And he made it very clear that he was willing to kill himself and take them with him."

Home for the 43-year-old native Hawaiian was a house on Kimberly Street in Wheaton. Neighbors say he'd been renting a back room in the house for the past several months.

"I never saw him 'smiley face,'" said next door neighbor Onnik Mutafian. "[He was] always bitter, always very serious looking.’

Mutafian says Lee had a soft spot for squirrels. But even that caused trouble.

"From day one, I had a bone to pick with him. I wanted him to stop feeding the squirrels," said Mutafian.

He says the peanuts attracted rats, which became a massive problem.

It appears Lee moved to Maryland from California simply to channel his anger about the environment - directly toward Discovery.

’He paid homeless people to protest along with him," McCarthy explained. "He would, as an incentive, if you yelled the loudest, he would give you a bonus of cash."

McCarthy says what inspired Lee to start tossing $20,000 in cash into the air in Silver Spring of February 2008 - an episode captured by a passerby on a cell phone camera and posted on YouTube - was something police had told him.

"He gave a homeless man a thousand dollars for writing an essay. Other homeless men found out he had a thousand dollars and they robbed him and hospitalized him," said McCarthy.

Police had hoped Lee would react to the news by keeping his money to himself.

Lee was charged with and eventually convicted of disorderly conduct and ordered to stay away from Discovery's headquarters for two years. The probationary period ended two weeks ago.

Lee was also convicted of smuggling aliens into the U.S. That was in federal court in California of September 2003.