by Justin D. Anderson
Capitol Reporter
www.dailymail.com
State Police say their investigation of a trooper's fatal shooting of a Jackson County man so far doesn't match the family's claims that the man was unarmed.
"The evidence that we've garnered up to this point regarding the investigation contradicts what the family is saying to the media," said Sgt. S.E. Wolfe of the Ripley detachment.
"Even the statements given by the family themselves. They're contradicting the very statements that they'd already given."
Family members of Michael S. Fisher, 35, have said Trooper First Class B.L. Keefer shot an unarmed man in cold blood late Saturday night.
Keefer said he showed up at the Fisher residence on Windell Ridge Road after hearing gunfire coming from there. Keefer reported telling Fisher numerous times to drop the large revolver he was holding, but Fisher refused, so Keefer shot and killed him.
Fisher's wife, Jill, has told media outlets that her husband was firing a gun up in the air, letting off steam. She says Fisher threw the gun aside when Keefer pulled up.
Wolfe declined to release details of an autopsy completed Tuesday or the witness statements gathered.
But Wolfe said witnesses who were at the Fisher residence on the day of the shooting indicated Fisher had been drinking all day and acting strangely.
"We have taken statements from people that were present with him throughout the day leading up to this incident that have described to us an individual who wasn't quite in his right state of mind," Wolfe said.
"There were some of his actions that occurred prior to the arrival of the police on scene that concerned family members that were present with him during the day."
Wolfe added that some witnesses said they were afraid of Fisher because of the way he was acting.
Keefer has been on administrative leave since the shooting, which is State Police policy in such situations. Wolfe said Keefer has been cleared by counselors to return to work and should do so in a couple days.
Fisher had made a high-profile suicide attempt in June by jumping off the William S. Ritchie Jr. Bridge in Jackson, apparently distraught over the deaths of his two small children in a boating accident two days before.
Fisher was piloting a boat on the Ohio River when it crashed into a barge in heavy fog. His sister-in-law also was killed.
The spot from where Fisher jumped off the bridge was about five miles upstream from the boating accident.
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