Security firm with guards facing murder charges fails to win back license in KC

An Overland Park-based private security company said Monday that it may go out of business after the Kansas City police board denied their appeal of a license revocation.

In July, the Kansas City Board of Police Commissioners placed Force One Security on a five-year probation and ordered them to pay a $5,000 fine after two of their security guards were charged with murder in a fatal shooting outside a Kansas City bar.

Jackson County prosecutors charged security guards Christopher L. Jones, 37, and Markell Pinkins, 22, with second-degree murder in the June 29 shooting death of Kevin Thomas, 45, following a disturbance outside the Yum Yum Bar & Grill at 24th Street and Van Brunt Boulevard. third

In September, the board voted to revoke the company’s license to operate in Kansas City because two of its employees failed their firearm qualification test. The board voted on Monday to deny the company’s appeal.

“Obviously we are very disappointed,” said Susan Dill, an attorney representing the company and its owner. “This is a company that employs 32 guards who all have families and are out of work. The owner of the security company is out of work.”

Nathan Garrett, president of the police board, said the board’s vote to uphold the decision revoking the license was based on the recommendation of Police Chief Rick Smith.

“We have had that under advisement for a couple of months from the owner through his counsel,” Garrett said. “We have had a record presented to us both from the (Police) Department and Ms. Dill. The board of police commissioners reviewed those items, reviewed that case in its totality, accumulative and arrived at the decision that the appeal should be denied.”

Dill said the board’s decision to revoke the company’s license was improper. She said the Police Department records show that failure to pass shooting qualification on a first attempt is common and most security guards pass on a subsequent attempt.

The police board’s decision would not likely affect the company’s license to operate a private security firm in Kansas, where it also has a license, but the vast majority of Force One’s business is done in Missouri, Dill said.

The criminal charges against the guards stemmed from an altercation with a motorist.

On June 29, Jones and Pinkins, who both worked as private security guards for Force One, were stationed at Yum Yum’s front door. Company officials said Jones was a recent hire and was shadowing Pinkins on the night of the shooting.

According to court records, the men left their post at the nightclub to investigate a vehicle wreck that happened across the street. Pinkins told police he heard a “boom” and observed the victim’s car strike a parked vehicle on 24th Street.

The two security guards later acknowledged to police that they lacked the authority to handle incidents off the bar’s premises, according to court records.

The guards repeatedly asked Thomas to turn off the car and get out of the vehicle.

According to prosecutors, Thomas removed his foot from the brake pedal of the car, allowing it to move toward the guards, and they shot him.

Thomas, 45, was taken to a hospital, where he later died.

Jones initially told investigators he didn’t fire his weapon, prosecutors allege.

However, he later told police that he did fire, in self-defense, because the victim “drove toward him.”

Investigators said that after the shooting, Jones asked a third man to hide the gun.

That man, Leon Arthur Kirk Doniphan, 37, of Kansas City is charged with tampering with physical evidence, according to court records.