South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley and the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation ruled that a Rapid City police officer was justified in shooting a suspect whom he thought was armed earlier this year.
The suspect, Kyle Whiting, 25, was walking outside of an apartment complex in the 100 block of East Signal Drive in Rapid City in the late morning on May 30, 2023, when the 911 caller identified two subjects, one of whom was Whiting, as refusing to leave the premises. The caller indicated that Whiting was prohibited by court order from being at the residence.
Two Rapid City police officers responded to the residence. Officer No. 1 saw Whiting walking in a parking lot and notified dispatch. Officer No. 2 saw Whiting running through the parking lot and started chasing him on foot, issuing commands for him to stop.
Whiting ran to the entrance to the apartment complex and tried to get through the door when Officer No. 2 confronted him.
Officer No. 2 started to give a command when Whiting, cornered in the apartment doorway, pointed a novelty gun-shaped lighter at the officer. The officer, believing the lighter was a gun, fired three rounds at Whiting. A bystander, who was standing behind the door, suffered a gunshot wound to the abdomen when the officer fired at Whiting. Both Whiting and the bystander were taken to the hospital after the incident, where Whiting was pronounced deceased.
Whiting had six active warrants in Pennington County, including outstanding arrest warrants for assault, controlled substance violations and four protection orders, including one prohibiting him from being at the 911 caller’s residence.
The investigation did not identify any history between the officer and Whiting.
An autopsy revealed Whiting suffered multiple gunshot wounds, and a drug screen showed a positive presence of methamphetamine, amphetamine and ketamine in Whiting’s system. The incident was captured by both officers’ body-worn cameras.
“Evidence collected at the scene, witness statements and a review of the video from the body-worn cameras of the two officers on scene indicate that the suspect did not comply with the officer’s verbal commands to stop,” Jackley said in a news release. “Only when the suspect pointed what appeared to be a gun at the officer, did the officer fire the officer’s weapon.”
This is the third completed officer-involved shooting investigation in South Dakota this year. A 2022 story
by the Mitchell Republic found that all 14 of the officer-involved shootings since 2018 were deemed a justified use of force by the AG and the DCI.