Deadly Miami Twp. police shooting follows Facebook message

State investigators will sort out conflicting accounts of the moments leading to Miami Twp. police’s deadly shooting of a 33-year-old resident after an early-morning confrontation at a mobile home park.

Robert Edwards died Wednesday morning after officers James M. McCarty and Shawn Todd responded to a welfare check when a Facebook user called police concerned that her ex-boyfriend in Oakwood Village would commit suicide, according to authorities and records.

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“We’re going to be very thorough” said Miami Twp. Capt. John Magill, explaining why the township asked the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation to oversee the case. “I think we owe that to the public, and we owe it ourselves. We’re not looking to hide anything.”

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The ninth officer-involved shooting in the Dayton area this year occurred after police said they repeatedly instructed Edwards to drop his weapon – what was later discovered to be a pellet gun — and he failed to comply.

A nearby witness, however, said she did not hear such a command from the officers, both of whom have been placed on paid administrative leave, which is standard protocol in shooting cases.

BCI agents were on scene Wednesday morning. It is second fatal officer-involved shooting in Dayton’s south suburbs in two months.

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Police did not say Wednesday whether both officers fired shots at Edwards.

McCarty and Todd responded to a call around 12:15 a.m. that a man at a home on Del Barton Avenue was making suicidal threats, “drinking and ready to pull the trigger,” Miami Twp. Police Chief Ron Hess said.

About 12:29 a.m. “officers made contact at the front door of the trailer, and warnings were given to the resident to drop a firearm,” Hess said at a Wednesday morning news conference. “Shots were fired at that time - roughly that time. Officers at about 12:31 reported there was a subject down.”

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But a woman staying at Edwards’ home said she did not hear officers command him to drop the weapon. Amber Plymesser described herself as a longtime friend of Edwards.

Plymesser said she awoke to the sound of her barking dog.

“I didn’t hear no knock or anybody announce themselves,” she said. “I looked. I saw a light coming in through the window, and I could tell it was a flashlight. And when Rob came into the living room, I asked him to check it out.

“And when he opened the door, the next thing I hear is ‘Stop, freeze’ and then three gunshots,” Plymesser said. “Then he was on the floor. Then I heard a cop say ‘suspect down.’ ”

The officers did not enter the home until after the shooting, when they sought to aid the wounded Edwards, according to Magill.

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Magill was among the handful of officers who responded to the shooting scene, which was taped off until about 8:30 a.m. Wednesday.

A preliminary cause of death for Edwards had not been issued as of Wednesday afternoon, according to the Montgomery County Coroner’s Office.

“If somebody needed a place to stay he didn’t care if he knew them or not,” said Shawna Stoff, grandmother to Edwards’ son. “I want the world to know he wasn’t a bad guy.”

RELATED: Other police involved shooting in the Dayton area in 2017

Stoff said Plymesser and her two daughters were staying at Edwards’ home at the time of the shooting. Plymesser called Edwards “a great person. He was not violent at all.”

“He was a really good person. He’s going to be really missed by a lot of people,” she said.

McCarty, 35, and Todd, 43, are “experienced officers,” Magill said. McCarty has 11 years of police experience and Todd has 15, Hess said.

This news organization has requested copies of the personnel files for McCarty and Todd.

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This is the ninth officer-involved shooting in the Dayton area this year, four more than in 2016, according to records by this news organization.

The last one occurred in Moraine during the early morning hours of Oct. 20, killing Jamarco McShann, 23. The Dayton man died after Moraine police officers fired multiple shots after they said McShann pointed at gun at them and failed to comply with commands to drop the weapon.

Moraine officers John Howard and Jerry Knight were placed on leave, but re-activated about a month ago before returning to full duty the first week of December, according to Police Chief Craig Richardson.

BCI, the investigative arm of the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, is also overseeing that case at the request of the Moraine Police Division.

As in the Moraine case, the Miami Twp. investigation is expected several weeks, said Dan Tierney, spokesman for the AG’s office.

The township “will assist them and provide to them any details that we have,” Magill said.

Staff writers Drew Simon and Max Filby contributed to this report.

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