Shooter in Black Friday killing in mall parking lot sentenced to prison

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A Jefferson City man who told police he was holstering his gun when he accidentally shot another man in the Columbia Mall parking lot in 2017 was sentenced last week to four years in prison.

Scott R. Randolph pleaded guilty Friday to one count of involuntary manslaughter, according to court records. He will receive credit for time served.

Randolph told police he was putting his gun, a 9 mm pistol, in a holster when it fired, striking Jeffrey Swope in the eye while inside a vehicle late on Black Friday, Nov. 23, 2017, according to a probable cause statement filed in the case.

Swope died days later at the hospital from a gunshot wound to the head.

Police found the gun strapped into its holster in the passenger floorboard of the vehicle Randolph and Swope had been in, according to the statement. However, police found no signs of damage to the holster and the Missouri State Highway Patrol Crime Lab was unable to fire the gun in three similar holsters without damaging them, the statement said.