Oklahoma officer charged with murder in shooting of suicidal man

OKLAHOMA CITY -- An Oklahoma City police officer who fatally shot a suicidal man was charged Tuesday with second-degree murder.

District Attorney David Prater filed the charge against Sgt. Keith Sweeney and listed an alternative charge of first-degree manslaughter in the Nov. 15 fatal shooting of 29-year-old Dustin Pigeon.

Police said Sweeney and another officer responded to a report of a suicidal person and found Pigeon trying to set fire to himself with a lighter fluid and a lighter in a courtyard surrounded by homes. Police say the other officer shot Pigeon with a bean bag, to no effect, before Sweeney shot him multiple times.  

Court documents do not list an attorney for Sweeney, who was taken into custody late Tuesday morning.

The charges "were filed after a review of the investigation by the Oklahoma City Police Department," Prater said in a statement.

The investigation into the shooting was conducted the same way as any other investigation, said Police Capt. Bo Mathews.

"We made sure we talked to all witnesses, to the officer and get his statement ... it's no different from any other crime we work ... this just happened to involve a police officer," Mathews said,

Pigeon's father Boston Pigeon told CBS affiliate KWTV he didn't understand why his son was fatally shot.

"He went out and helped people. He just was not a mean man. He was not," he said. "He was a good person."

Sweeney is a nine-year veteran of the police department, the station reports. He was involved in another fatal shooting in 2015 when police say a suspect attempted to hit two officers with a vehicle, according to KWTV.