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BELLAIRE - Police had been to 4277 Harrison St. in the past, but Chief Michael Kovalyk never imagined his officers would respond there to find a man dead.

Eric Wheeler, 18, was killed in that home early Thursday morning after suffering a shotgun blast to the chest allegedly fired by 62-year-old Ronald Byard. Kovalyk said both men lived in the Harrison Street home, and the shooting followed a "domestic situation" involving Wheeler and a female at the residence.

Kovalyk said he could discuss little of the details in the investigation. He said he considers Wheeler's death a tragedy, but officers were not strangers to the home in which the man died.

"It's a tragedy when someone loses there life at such a young age regardless of the circumstances," Kovalyk said. "It wouldn't be proper to release anything further, and I wouldn't do so unless given the OK by the prosecutor.

"We have had numerous calls at that residence," the chief said of the death scene. "There were numerous disorderly and disturbance calls."

Police responded to the home at about 12:30 a.m. Thursday. Wheeler was found dead by Bellaire police officers responding to the scene. Byard was taken into custody at gunpoint. The weapon recovered was a 12-gauge, single-shot shotgun, according to the chief.

He said an arrest was made almost immediately after the shooting was reported.

"A minute later they arrived at the scene, and at 12:36 they had a suspect and a weapon secured," Kovalyk said. "The suspect came out on the porch, and he was ordered down at gun point."

Kovalyk said the officers called for an emergency medical squad and secured the area. The Belmont County coroner was called, and Wheeler was declared dead at the scene. The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation has been contacted by Bellaire police.

Byard was being held Thursday in the Belmont County jail on $20,000 bond on a charge of murder.