Staff photo / Ed Runyan ... A multitude of police officers and others with the Youngstown Police Department and other agencies converged on Helena Avenue on the South Side on Thursday morning. Youngstown police officers responding to a burglary call killed a person inside the house.

YOUNGSTOWN — Youngstown police officers responding Thursday morning to a burglary call at a South Side home shot and killed a man inside the house.

Capt. Brad Blackburn, who spoke at the scene at 4312 Helena Ave. a couple of hours after the shooting, declined to discuss specifics. He said the matter has been “handed over to (the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation). We’re going to let that run its course.”

Blackburn said the Youngstown Police Department “contacted BCI” about the killing. “They (BCI) are going to take over the investigation at this point,” he said. “None of the officers were injured.”

Blackburn said when officers arrived at the two-story brick home, they “found an individual in the house that did not have a right to be there. We had an officer-involved shooting at that point. The individual is deceased.”

A Youngstown police news release late Thursday stated that the shooting took place just before 10 a.m., after police “encountered a male inside the home. An officer discharged their firearm during this incident, which resulted in the unfortunate death of the male, who succumbed from his injuries on scene.”

The release states BCI is carrying out an “independent investigation into the circumstances surrounding the shooting. The Youngstown Police Department Internal Affairs Division will be conducting an internal investigation, which reviews departmental policy.”

The release added, “Officers involved were placed on paid administrative leave pursuant to departmental policy.”

Neither the deceased man nor the officers have been identified.

Dominic Binkley, deputy press secretary for Ohio BCI and Attorney General Dave Yost, first confirmed to The Vindicator that a BCI investigator was in Youngstown to handle an officer-involved fatal shooting and that the Youngstown Police Department requested BCI’s assistance in the investigation.

Binkley also said the investigation is in its preliminary stages, and BCI was not releasing any further information at this time.

The shooting happened in a neighborhood between Southern Boulevard and Market Street, south of Midlothian Boulevard. It is near Boardman Township and Valley Christian Schools on Southern Boulevard. The neighborhood commonly is referred to as the Handel’s Neighborhood or Cottage Grove.

POLICE PRESENCE

Many police converged on the property early Thursday, but initially police were mum on details of what was developing. A coroner’s investigator and Youngstown investigator hinted at the possibility of an officer-involved, fatal shooting.

When an investigator from the Ohio BCI arrived around 11:10 a.m., the police shooting became more apparent.

Youngstown Mayor Jamael Tito Brown and Police Chief Carl Davis also stood along Helena Avenue, among dozens of police personnel, mostly detectives and at least one crime-scene investigator. An ambulance remained parked on the street near the home involved for a few hours.

Later, crime-scene tape was strung around the house and in other areas on the opposite side of the street, keeping much of Helena Avenue off limits to public access.

One woman who lives nearby the shooting said her son heard a “pop, pop, pop” sound Thursday morning. She said she did not know the time it occurred. She added that she first realized police were in the neighborhood around 10 a.m.

Blackburn said the police department also will do some investigation into the matter, in addition to BCI. “It will cross mesh at some point. We do certain things administratively that we have to. We just called in BCI for transparency,” he said.

Blackburn is head of the patrol division and part of the team that responds to any officer-involved shootings or officer weapons discharges. That is why he went to the scene, he said.

PRIOR YPD SHOOTINGS

A search of Vindicator archives suggests that the most recent officer-involved shooting in Youngstown occurred in January 2018. It came when police attempted to stop a masked man walking on the street on Pasadena Avenue, also on the city’s South Side.

The man, Gerald Wainwright was shot after Wainwright fired three shots at officers, who were not hit. The officers returned fire, wounding Wainwright three times. Wainwright survived and was charged with felonious assault on a police officer and having weapons while not allowed.

An internal affairs investigation carried out by the Youngstown Police Department cleared the two officers of wrongdoing.

No other incidents appeared in a search back to December of 2014.