MOUNT VERNON — No grand jury review is necessary in a June incident that left two Butler Township residents dead, according to Knox County Prosecutor Chip McConville.
McConville made the decision after receiving results of the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s (BCI) investigation, according to a press release issued by his office.
“The BCI investigation found that the incident amounted to a murder-suicide,” McConville said.
McConville said that in previous officer-involved shootings in Knox County in recent years, the cases have been presented to a grand jury to decide whether the use of force was reasonable.
In Ohio, a grand jury decides if the state has sufficient evidence to bring felony charges against a citizen.
However, in those cases, officers fatally shot suspects using potential deadly force against them or others.
“Here, no injuries were inflicted by Knox County deputies, thus no grand jury presentation is necessary,” McConville said.
“It was a long and involved investigation. They did all of the work that was necessary. From my perspective, it reaches a very simple conclusion,” the prosecutor said.
Knox County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a 9-1-1 call at 10180 Busenberg Road on June 5 at 1:21 a.m.
McConville told Knox Pages that deputies entered the house to find Lauretta Beltz-Frazee and W. Lloyd Ray in a back room.
Beltz-Frazee called to the officers from the back room, saying Ray had injured her.
Ray came out of the back room and fired at the deputies. Deputy William Cottrell returned fire, but his shots did not strike Ray.
Ray returned to the back room and shot Beltz-Frazee with a .22 caliber rifle. He then fired additional shots at the deputies, who had taken cover behind their vehicles outside the home.
He later took his own life with the .22 rifle.
KCSO requested BCI to investigate
The initial Knox County Sheriff’s Office report stated that Ray released an unknown chemical.
“It was determined during the course of the investigation that Ray set off a fire extinguisher to lay down a cloud cover between himself and the deputies,” McConville told Knox Pages.
McConville said deputies safely removed a child and another resident of the house from the situation.
Knox County Sheriff Daniel Weckesser requested the BCI investigation on June 5. The investigation included agents from BCI’s Force Investigations Unit, Crime Scene Unit, Cyber Crime Unit, and the BCI Laboratory.
“I appreciate the willingness of Attorney General Dave Yost to take on these investigations and make resources available to Knox County,” McConville said in the release.
“These investigations are always exhaustive in scope and unbiased in their presentation.”