A Columbus woman who told police she shot her husband in self-defense after he threatened her will spend 6 to 7.5 years in prison after pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter. Courtney Grisby, 42, was sentenced Wednesday for the July 2025 death of Ra’Quwan Kilgore, 29.
According to The Columbus Dispatch, Grisby initially faced a murder charge before entering the plea in Franklin County Common Pleas Court. Judge Mark Serrott imposed the prison term as part of Wednesday’s resolution, ending the case without a trial.
Kilgore was shot shortly before 6 a.m. on July 18, 2025, in the 300 block of South Guilford Avenue in Columbus. A release from the Columbus Division of Police said an adult woman at the scene identified herself as the shooter and claimed she had acted after Kilgore threatened her.
Police said Kilgore was taken to a hospital with a gunshot wound but died later that day. The department’s investigation identified domestic violence as a possible motive, and a Franklin County grand jury indicted Grisby on murder charges in September 2025.
The Plea Settled A Case That Began As Murder
Grisby’s guilty plea substantially changed the legal posture of the case, replacing the original murder prosecution with an involuntary-manslaughter conviction. The Ohio Revised Code defines involuntary manslaughter as causing another person’s death as a proximate result of committing or attempting to commit a felony or misdemeanor.
Because the case ended with a plea, no jury will issue a verdict on Grisby’s self-defense claim. That claim was part of the initial police account, but the sentence reflects the offense to which Grisby admitted in court rather than a finding that the shooting was legally justified.
What Happens Next
Grisby will serve the prison term ordered by Serrott in a case that began with a fatal domestic shooting and spent more than a year moving through the Franklin County court system. Kilgore’s death was initially investigated as a homicide, while Wednesday’s plea brought the criminal proceedings to a close without a public trial over the competing accounts of what happened inside the Columbus home.
