Tony Carr cleared a year after officer-involved shooting - WTVM.com-Columbus, GA News Weather & Sports

It's been a year since the robbery of the MEA Federal Credit Union and the Columbus police shooting that left two men dead.

Important questions that lingered about Tony Carr, one of the men killed that day, have been answered.

"After careful review, I find nothing, in either the investigatory report from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, nor the follow up investigation conducted by the Office of the District Attorney, to indicate that Tony Carr was involved in the robbery of the MEA [Federal] Credit Union," said District Attorney Julia Slater in a press release Friday afternoon.

"Although this office has never implicated Mr. Carr of any wrongdoing, I believe it is important for me to release this finding," Slater continued. "Because of the developments in the follow-up investigation, I am not yet in a position to release the next step for this case."

Carr was an Army-employed civilian who worked at Fort Benning's Directorate of Emergency Services as a fire inspector.

On September 2011, Carr went to his home on Gardenia Drive during his break to let his dog out. At the same time, robbery suspect Alrahiem Tolbert ran from the MEA Federal Credit Union off Macon Road on foot, saw Carr, and jumped into his truck.

Moments later, both men were dead.

Local leaders from the NAACP and Carr's family have been asking for answers surrounding this case for months.

"The DA has her time and her cycle that she works on," said Nate Sanderson, the President of the Columbus Chapter of the NAACP. "That's not the purpose of this case. What we are talking about is we're talking about having our elected officials be accountable to the community. They owe us an update on what is going on."

"He was not involved in this robbery," said Schanta Newman, a friend of Carr. "It was not in his character. I believe he was hijacked and held hostage in his own vehicle."

Mark Post, candidate for District Attorney in the Chattahoochee Judicial Circuit, has repeatedly criticized the District Attorney for her delay in deciding whether a crime was committed in the course of the officer's response to the credit union robbery.

Post added that in addition to the lack of closure for the family, there is the additional issue of keeping an officer on indefinite leave.

"Officer Vincent Lockhart Jr. has been on paid administrative leave since that day in September of last year," Post said. "I suspect that Officer Lockhart would like to get back to work. And, of course the taxpayers are paying for that."

Slater told News Leader 9 last month that she had a good reason for the delay.

"I can assure you that I have been working diligently on this matter and it will be resolved as soon as possible," said Slater. "Having performed this task in my role as District Attorney, I know that each officer-related shooting must be handled on a case-by-case basis and there can be no artificial timeline."

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