The clouds of conflicting stories surrounding the police killing of a friend of one of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects need to be cleared, officially and with some dispatch.

While we understand there are ongoing investigations into the shooting of Ibragim Todashev during questioning, authorities should quickly release an explanation — even a brief one — of what led to the May 22 killing of the Chechen man.

In the vacuum, anonymous sources have given different details about the events, and some versions portray the FBI in an unfavorable light.

Authorities were questioning Todashev about a triple homicide in Massachusetts, in which Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev was another suspect, when, well, something happened.

Various accounts say he had a knife when he lunged at an agent. Another says he was unarmed. Some reports say he upended a table. In one bizarre account, he was reportedly trying to grab a s amurai sword that was in the room. And in another, he is said to have run at an agent with a metal pole before being shot.

Todashev’s father has accused cops of killing his son “execution style.” Abdul-Baki Todashev said his son was shot six times in the torso and once in the back of the head.

“They tortured a man for eight hours with no attorney, no witnesses, nobody. We can only guess what was going on there, until there is an official investigation,” Todashev said.

The incident, and the various accounts of what happened, raise questions of police conduct in the case.

The connection to the Boston Marathon bombing suspect, and potential terrorism ramifications, make this a high-interest case from public interest and law enforcement standpoints.

While he was being questioned, Todashev implicated himself and Tsarnaev in the unsolved murders of three men who were found with their throats slashed, marijuana and cash strewn over their bodies.

The manner of the murders and the date — Sept. 11, 2011 — raise questions about whether suspects Todashev and Tsarnaev were engaged in some sort of ideological war against the U.S. and whether they had help.

That makes it all the more crucial to get to the bottom of the Todashev shooting, and quickly.

The FBI has been parsimonious with details, saying little beyond the fact that they are investigating and it may take months. In addition, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division is investigating, as are local prosecutors.

And all of that is all well and good. But in the meantime, speculation will percolate about what happened and whether the shooting was justified.

Releasing a cogent, truthful account of the incident could take some of the edge off the conspiracy theories and provide some answers to affected families and the public.