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Geoff Jones
Geoff Jones

Jones defends CPD response to Vibez Lounge shooting

Columbia police are still investigating a deadly downtown shooting at a club on Feb. 2, and how officers responded.

Security guard Tershawn Kitchen was killed while working as a security guard at Vibez Lounge on North Fifth Street. The suspected shooter is in custody.

CPD chief Geoff Jones said on Saturday’s Inside Columbia Show there’s always room for improvement, but he feels his officers did what they could to help.

“I also feel like we’ve built relationships in a way that, if I tell people that we’re looking at video and we will state facts that we see from those videos, that they’ll trust me until I can release the videos.”

Vibez Lounge has said online that officers pushed staffers away who tried to save Kitchen, and let him die. CPD disputed that in a video released last week.

Chief Jones says the back-and-forth does not have to hurt the police department’s relationship with the African-American community.

“Just getting the information out there, and having that conversation with the night club owners and other people in the community, it really is an opportunity just to share information and let them see that we’re being transparent and we’re going to give that information in the best way we know how.”

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