By Jeb Phillips
The Columbus Dispatch
NORTH LINDEN, Oh. — Police say a long-standing feud among North Linden residents might have led to the fatal shooting of a man early yesterday.
But the man’s friends and family said he had never met the person charged with shooting him and that he was simply trying to break up a fight.
That fight began in front of 2613 Osceola Ave. about 1:40 a.m., and shots were fired from at least two weapons, police said.
Chad Wolford, 25, died at the scene. Two other men were shot but were expected to survive. One was taken to Riverside Methodist Hospital. The other was taken to Ohio State University Medical Center.
About 11 a.m. yesterday, Robert J. Ruark, 21, was arrested and charged with murder and two counts of felonious assault.
The fight broke out among people who had been inside adjacent houses at 2613 and 2609 Osceola, police said.
Wolford had been hanging out with friends at 2613 Osceola when someone from next door started a verbal altercation, said his girlfriend, Katie Adams, 23, who was there. Wolford had gone outside to try to calm the people when he was shot, she said.
When police arrived, several people ran inside 2609 Osceola and wouldn’t come out until SWAT officers were called, Sgt. Patricia Bahen said.
As officers entered 2613 Osceola, they were confronted by two pit bulls, which they shot and killed, WBNS-TV (Channel 10) reported. But witnesses said they had warned the officers about the dogs and had offered to restrain them before police entered.
Bahen said investigators might have interviewed as many as a dozen people who witnessed or were involved in the fight. Yesterday afternoon, police still were trying to figure out the causes of the fight and the longtime feud.
According to public records, Ruark once was a resident at 2609 Osceola and now lives about 2 1/2 miles away at 2586 Parkwood Ave.
At Wolford’s home on Cleveland Avenue yesterday, his girlfriend and sister remembered him as a loving father to his 3-year-old daughter, Chazarae, who wanted to get out of the North Linden neighborhood.
“You see what happens here,” said Frankie Wolford, 32, his sister.
He graduated from Linden-McKinley High School in 2001, Wolford and Adams said, and had worked in a factory for Worthington Cylinders. He would have turned 26 today.
Other residents on Osceola Avenue said they heard explosions last night but couldn’t tell what caused them.
“You can’t tell if it’s the fireworks or gunshots this time of year,” said Nicki Valdez, 25.
Craig Thompson, 48, who lives about a block south of the crime scene, said that gunfire once was common on Osceola Avenue in the summer but that increased police patrols and new streetlights had helped in the past few years.
“I thought things were getting quieter around here,” he said.
Copyright 2008 The Columbus Dispatch