Stephen Clancy Hill was "hell-bent" on taking lives and was indiscriminate about his victims, police detective Joel Price said.
Hill plunged to his death on Saturday after police officers trapped him on a hillside cliff overlooking the San Fernando Valley.
Price said officers believe Hill jumped rather than fell after they tried to take him into custody following a nine-hour standoff. Police said the actor, armed with the sword he used in the June 1 attack, had repeatedly threatened suicide.
News video shows Hill, still holding the sword, tumbling off the cliff after sliding to its edge from a seated position. Several officers had moved to almost within reach of him.
Earlier, police said he went over the cliff after a "less than lethal munition" was fired at him. They haven't said whether the projectile struck him.
"Everyone out there would have wished for a different outcome," Price said. But he said officers had to try to take Hill into custody after failing to persuade him to surrender.
Hill's death came just four days after he went on a rampage at Ultima DVD's production facility in the San Fernando Valley. He fatally stabbed one Ultima employee, Herbert Hin Wong, 30, and wounded two others, Christopher Rachal, 36, and Yuri Drell, 28.
Hill, 34, had worked both as an actor and in production for Ultima, a small company that produces niche films featuring fetishes and sexual domination of men. He had been living on a film set at the production facility but was recently fired and ordered to move out.
On Friday, the district attorney's office charged Hill with one count of murder and five counts of attempted murder for the attacks, which occurred during a small social gathering at the facility.
Police said Hill fled to the San Fernando Valley hillside after officers found him hiding in a nearby house in the valley's West Hills neighbourhood.
Hill, who acted under the name Steve Driver, is credited with 13 films on the Internet Adult Film Database.
