The 911 call was as chilling as it was cryptic: “I am the Son of Man. I just killed the man of sin.”
When police officers arrived shortly after the call to a middle-class neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley, they discovered James Handy, a character actor in such films as “Logan,” “Top Gun: Maverick” and “Arachnophobia,” stabbed to death on a front lawn. He was 81.
A 44-year-old man who is the son of Mr. Handy’s girlfriend was arrested on a murder charge, according to a statement from the Los Angeles Police Department. The man, Michael Gledhill, is being held on $2 million bail.
At a hearing on Friday afternoon, Javier Trincado, a public defender, told the court that Mr. Gledhill couldn’t assist in his own defense, and the case was transferred to a mental health court. Mr. Gledhill did not appear.
The police said they were alerted to the crime when someone called 911 at 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday to announce himself as the Son of Man, a biblical epithet for Jesus.
Upon arriving at the home, in the Tarzana neighborhood of Los Angeles, police officers found Mr. Handy unconscious in the front yard, stabbed in the chest. He was pronounced dead after being taken to a hospital.
Mr. Gledhill, who had lived at the home with his mother, flagged down police officers and told them he was the person they were looking for, the police said.
Jade Carlson, who lives near the house, said that on Wednesday morning, after the killing but before anyone was arrested, she asked a man on the street if he knew why there were police cars in the neighborhood.
Later, she realized she had been speaking to Mr. Gledhill.
“I said, ‘Hey, do you know what happened?’” she recalled. He kept on walking.
“He was scary-looking,” she said. “He kind of reminded me of Charles Manson.”
About 10 minutes later, she said, the man was arrested several houses down from hers.
Joheina Quibol, another neighbor, on Friday said Mr. Handy and his girlfriend often greeted her in the morning when they ran into one another.
“I feel really devastated, because they were, like, the nicest ever to us,” Ms. Quibol, 23, said. “I feel so sad right now.”
It was a different story with the suspect, she said. Ms. Quibol said her father had warned her to stay away from Mr. Gledhill, who once knocked on their door to complain about the family’s outdoor camera security system.
“My dad told us he was being aggressive and paranoid,” she said. “He said to be cautious around him.”
Mr. Handy had appeared in major films, but often as a supporting character in cameo-like roles.
In the gory 2017 film “Logan,” which starred Hugh Jackman as the clawed antihero Wolverine, Mr. Handy played a doctor who tended to Wolverine’s injuries in an urgent-care clinic.
In “Top Gun: Maverick,” the 2022 film that was led by Tom Cruise as a fighter pilot, Mr. Handy portrayed a bartender, Jimmy, at a beachfront bar frequented by military personnel. Mr. Cruise and Mr. Handy were also castmates in the 1981 film “Taps,” one of Mr. Cruise’s earliest projects.
He played an exterminator in the 1995 film “Jumanji” and was a coroner named Milton Briggs in 1990 movie “Arachnophobia.” One of Mr. Handy’s most notable and consistent television roles was Arthur Devlin, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, in the thriller series “Alias.”
“Taps” was Mr. Handy’s film debut, but one friend recalled in a social media post that his big break came the year later, when he played opposite Paul Newman in a legal drama, “The Verdict.” The friend, Carl Kurlander, a screenwriter and producer, wrote on Facebook: “As someone who had the privilege to know the man, I just wanted to attest to his kindness which I have not forgotten, his humility and dedication to craft.”
“He was a real actor committed to his craft,” Mr. Kurlander said in an interview. “He wasn’t in it for the fame.”
Another friend, Brian Delate, a fellow actor, wrote on Facebook that Mr. Handy was a Vietnam veteran. He was “engaging, funny and was a terrific talent,” Mr. Delate wrote, and was also a “rabid Mets fan.”
His talent agent, Pam Ellis-Evenas, said in an email that she “could not have asked for a more talented, humble or gracious client and friend than James Handy.”
Georgia Gee and Sheelagh McNeill contributed research. Victor Mather and Emmanuel Morgan contributed reporting.