COLUMBUS – A review board has determined a SWAT team officer’s fatal shooting of a robbery suspect outside a convenience store on the Southeast Side in 2015 was justified.
Officer Barry Kirby fatally shot Kaleb Alexander on Oct. 15, 2015 outside a United Dairy Farmers store at 2660 Noe Bixby Road.
Police say officers staked out the store after being told the same man had robbed it the two previous nights.
A grand jury declined to issue an indictment in the case.
At approximately 12:17 a.m. on the morning of the shooting, officers working a robbery stakeout saw Alexander, 25, enter the store with a handgun, held an employee at gunpoint and demanded cash, police spokesman Sgt. Rich Weiner said. He left the store and was shot multiple times by Kirby after ignoring commands by officers to drop the gun.
A firearm and an undisclosed amount of cash were recovered at the scene.
At the time of the shooting, robbery detectives were investigating additional robberies at the store and believed Alexander was responsible for robberies the previous two nights, Weiner said.
Weiner says the Firearms/Police-Involved Death Review Board determined that Kirby’s actions were within the Division of Police’s policy on the use of firearms.