Officer On Patrol Hits, Kills Pedestrian

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A pedestrian was hit and killed by a passing car early Sunday, and authorities said a police officer was behind the wheel.

Minerva Park Officer Jason Gross, 34, was on patrol when he hit a man standing in the road, according to the Fraternal Order of Police or FOP.

Boback Pourfarhadi, 25, of Columbus died at the scene, NBC 4's Tacoma Newsome reported.

Gross was not speeding and did not have on his lights or sirens, the FOP said.

Boback's family said he was walking with two friends along Westerville Road around 3:30 a.m. They said Boback was walking from one apartment complex to another when he was hit and killed.

The family said they weren't told Boback was killed by a Minerva Park officer.

"The first thing I asked was, 'Was the person who hit him drinking?' They said, no, the man was not drinking. They didn't say the officer was not drinking. They didn't say anything like an officer had hit him," Boback's brother Russell Pourfarhadi said.

Alcohol was suspected, on the part of the pedestrian, as contributing factor in this incident, a police report said.

Newsome asked the Russell and Boback's father, Mehrdad Pourfarhadi, whether they thought the victim was drinking.

"At 3:30 in the morning, I'm sure they were," Mehrdad said. "But that doesn't make it excusable the police officer to ran somebody over -- unless he was drinking, too."

Newsome tried to talk to the Minerva police department to get its side of the story but was referred to CPD, which is handling the investigation.

Boback fell on the road and was accidentally run over, according to a CPD report.

Either way, the family called the act "senseless."

"The police department says, 'We protect and serve.' The only thing they didn't do was protecting the citizens," Mehrdad said.

There wasn't any evidence indicating there was alcohol in Gross' system. Gross hadn't been charged with any crime Monday. He was placed on paid administrative leave, though.

Boback, a Westerville North graduate, was in town visiting family and friends. He recently started a business in West Virginia and was engaged to be married.

The Pourfarhadi family was planning Boback's funeral, Newsome reported.

CPD continued to investigate the cause of the accident.

Stay tuned to NBC 4 and refresh nbc4i.com for more information on this developing story.

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