Update: Weezer bassist promotes Coachella gig after wife’s police shooting
It appears that the show will go on for Weezer bassist Scott Shriner, who declared Thursday that he still plans to perform with his band at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival this weekend, even after his wife’s arrest on suspicion of attempted murder after a bizarre standoff and police shooting outside their Los Angeles home.
“See you in Coachella,” Shriner declared to a New York Post reporter who caught up with the musician as he was returning home from walking the couple’s three dogs. Shriner had earlier thanked the reporter for asking about his wife, Jillian Lauren, who sustained a non-life-threatening wound in the shoulder, after being shot by police when she refused repeated commands to put down her gun.
“She’s alright, thank you for asking,” he said.
Shriner’s chipper response could be seen as bizarre, as the incident that has landed his wife, Lauren, a best-selling memoirist and true-crime writer, in legal trouble. On Tuesday afternoon, Lauren inadvertently found herself in the middle of a police pursuit through her Los Angeles neighborhood, with officers looking for suspects involved in an unrelated misdemeanor hit-and-run car crash that occurred on the Ventura Freeway, according to an LAPD news release.
The suspects had fled into Shriner and Lauren’s Eagle Rock neighborhood, and one was seen running behind a house on Waldo Place — the cul-de-sac where the couple live with their two sons, according to NPR. Shriner reportedly was not home at the time.
When officers reached the backyard of a house where the suspect was seen, they saw a woman, later identified as Lauren, in the yard next door. While she was not involved in the hit-and-run, she was holding a pistol.
The officers ordered Lauren to drop the handgun numerous times; however, she refused, an LAPD news release said. Police said Shriner then pointed the handgun at the officers, with police sources also telling TMZ that she fired at least one shot.
Police fired back, with officers telling local news outlet KTLA that Lauren was struck in the shoulder. She fled inside but eventually came back out. She was recorded by local TV news helicopters — hovering above the scene — emerging from her home and lying face down in the middle of the street as officers approached her, carefully at first. They then placed handcuffs on her.
Lauren was taken to a hospital for treatment for the gunshot wound and subsequently released on a $1 million bond. A 9-millimeter handgun was subsequently found in Lauren and Shriner’s home.
Five weeks earlier, Lauren revealed on Instagram that she had undergone surgery at Adventist Glendale Hospital for a “complicated operation” related to a cancer diagnosis that involved two surgeries and “a full hysterectomy.”
In this March 3 Instagram post, she shared a photo of herself either before or after surgery. “Yes, I have a little bit of the C word y’all,” she said. “I’m here to thank the incredible oncology team here, who pulled me through a complicated operation without a hitch.”
In a follow-up post on March 22, Lauren wrote that two other people she knew had undergone a similar procedure and “neither is with us here today.” But she assured her 16,000 followers: “I’m okay and healing today.
While Lauren was initially identified in news reports as Shriner’s wife, she has enjoyed an accomplished career in her own right. She is the author of several books across multiple genres, starting with her 2010 memoir, “Some Girls: My Life in a Harem,” which chronicled her time spent in the harem of Prince Jefri Bolkiah, brother of the Sultan of Brunei.
Lauren wrote another memoir in 2015, “Everything You Ever Wanted,” which recounted her experience adopting an Ethiopian child with special needs. More recently, Lauren published a true crime book in 2023: “Behold the Monster,” for which she interviewed serial killer Samuel Little and gained his trust, after which he confessed to the murders of 93 women.