Talk:Cincinnati riots of 2001

Completely Biased
"Of the cited fifteen black men killed by police action since 1995, three (including Thomas) had not even used deadly weapons against police (only ten were firearms, the rest had tried to run the police officers over using motor vehicles), and only four police officers were killed or wounded in the course of the related arrest attempts. [4] Despite all the situations which led to the deaths of the young black males, no police were ever found guilty through any civil or criminal trials; in only one case were the police officers involved reprimanded and given extra training (Death of Michael Carpenter by Officers Michael Miller, III and Brent McCurley)."

I especially loved how "only ten" of the 15 used firearms and how the others "only" tried to use vehicles to "run the police over"

Bias really needs to be corrected

How is this biased? It's factual. Just because it makes the CPD look bad doesn't mean it's not true. Where is the bias? --Duemellon 14:45, 15 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't see how it is a neutral point of view to say "only" in those sentences. And the paragraph suggests with its tone that police officers shouldn't use deadly force unless the suspect already kills or wounds a police officer. Peoplesunionpro 05:41, 31 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I will agree the "only four" part can be reduced to "four". The phrase: "had not even used deadly weapons" could be changed to "did not have deadly weapons and ten were armed with firearms". However, it is safe to say the police are not to employ deadly force unless there is a perceived risk of harm to themselves or others. --Duemellon 20:40, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't know about you, but having a firearm pulled out or a car trying to run you over is not perceived, it is reality.76.177.39.156 (talk) 01:08, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

This article is absolutely biased. Not what it says about why the riots happened, that's fine, but it says practically nothing about the details of the rioters crimes. Many business' windows were smashed, car windows were smashed of people sitting in their cars, and innocent people assaulted who had absolutely nothing to do with Timothy Thomas. Where is that at? THAT is the bias of this article. In fact I'd say it completely downplays the actions of the rioters, and points lots of fingers at police. This article sounds like it was written BY A RIOTER. There are other things too. It says rioters set "small fires"? Define "small." And a "small crowd" formed? How "small?" How about stating an approximate number of people instead? For such a controversial subject this article seriously lacks good, verifiable, inline references; which are needed on practically every statement. If a statement isn't verifiable it will be challenged and removed. I will be doing research and cleaning up this article in the future because it SERIOUSLY, SERIOUSLY needs it. J.H (talk) 21:02, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

dude, I was there, it didn't start this way. It started with a peaceful demonstration downtown (not in OTR) it erupted into a riot when the police shot a little black girl and several others with beanbag guns in the back (caught on video, shown on news, she was on her way home from school, but could cross the street because the cops in riot gear wouldn't let her the news said). They were also going around macing people and arresting people for being black. Then the news showed some of these things on tv and it was on! And yes rioter broke windows, stole stuff and started fires. It's a riot, this is what happens in a riot. You don't like riots, don't go around letting the cops murder people left ad right! Obviously, someone from CPD has been messing with this article, again. 72.91.70.49 (talk) 00:56, 30 July 2009 (UTC) -- whoops forgot to sign in (Texxs)

The Owensby Trial
Sorry, I didnt' have the time to really flesh it out. It was not going to remain a simple copy of the information here. There is much more information to detail it with & will be included. I am removing the redirect as it is it's own separate issue and article. --Duemellon 13:02, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Fordmadoxfraud, Owensby's death was decided by court to have been caused by improper police procedures. Whether it was the initial choke hold or improperly caring for an injured person, they did not follow the procedures in place at the time which would have prevented him from dying (or at least prevented him from not having medical attention for the length of time he did). I do believe, with the judge's and later court proceeding's decisions, we can say they were the cause & not as just a possible POV. I am open to discuss any wording you feel would keep this fact in mind --Duemellon 12:16, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Roach shoots Thomas
Removed the statement that Thomas reportedly had a brick. From the multitudinous reports I've seen I have never heard any mention of him possibly being armed having been stated before or during the chase. Even after he was shot there was no initial reports of him being armed. It was later, after Roach was interviewed by investigations that the suspicion of Thomas being armed came up. If you have information otherwise, please share. --Duemellon 04:20, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

What lawsuit ?
In the second paragraph of the section Background of tensions, the word lawsuit pops up twice, but it's not clear what this refers to. Does anybody know ?Unmitigated Success 14:02, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

The lawsuit was in reference to the lawsuit mentioned in the next point. Added a link to the "lawsuit" word to point to it for clarification. --Duemellon 01:46, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

No citations
There are no citations for this article. External links do not count towards this, as they must be introduced per WP:CITE using tags. There are places where the tone is also not as approperiate as I would have hoped, with a slant against the police officers - i.e. unbalanced. Let's try and correct these issues and get this article up to par.  Seicer  (talk) (contribs) 20:59, 20 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I would like for you to be specific on which pieces of this have an inappropriate tone. Whereas I appreciate your interest, I do request specificity in your feedback or even a rewrite to assist. However, I do want to point out that the information present in the sources provided factually point to the CPD acting improperly with dubious intent and perhaps the bias you think you see are really just the facts as they really are? --Duemellon 01:54, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I have no bias in this as I am from out of the area (Lexington) but do not bother reading up on the news for your region. I kept out of the loop for the riots and the aftermath so I am pretty much as unbiased as I am. For inapproperiate tone, there are some areas that seem to be more conversational than anything and I will try tommorrow at work, to go through and rewrite some parts (keeping existing material in place).  Seicer  (talk) (contribs) 03:09, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

if you don't feel comfortable rewriting them, at least point out which ones. Thanks --Duemellon 10:19, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Due to no response or specificity, the NPOV tag will be removed. If the person with the complaint cannot find specific items or suggestions, it can be assumed it is because they find no factual flaws, bending, or bias to point out & in this case it may just mean that, after review, even though the information may put a certain entity in a bad light, the information is factual & not skewed. --Duemellon 15:24, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Problems with links
This article is so bad in the linkage. Items in the links for instance say 'Cincinnati Post' which links to the article about that newpaper, NOTHING about the topic. I will [in time] try to fix much of this, but it is a morass of bad linkage. --Dumarest 00:05, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I would also cull links that fail WP:EL or are just "spam-links." I removed a few a while ago but much more needs to be done. In essence, there should be no need for external link categories.  Seicer  (talk) (contribs) 00:13, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Monstertrucker edits
1) I removed the statements about cops being killed or not during the confrontations. The explanation the Blacks had died "during apprehension, chase, confrontation or while in custody in cruisers" which covers that. Adding that information isn't necessary & was inserted clumsily.

2) Removed the statement that whites were pulled from cars, hit with bats, & screams of "get whitey filled the air" as being non-essential & sensationalistic. The statement: "There was violence against White and non-Black citizens who were in the area"

3)There was a removal (previous to Monstertrucker's changes) of the statement after the citation that national trends show Blacks resist arrest more often then whites as that information is borderline surperflous. The point wasn't how little or often whites do or don't resist, it's that, despite how many whites resited none of them died! Currently considering removing that factoid as well. --Duemellon 23:39, 29 October 2006 (UTC)


 * 1) Why was the link explaining the background of the 15 blacks that were killed removed? Why should readers of this article not know some of the very extreme incidents that happened during these confrontations?  If the link is to be removed, put one of those footnotes in that directs the reader to the article in the reference section.  The statement that they died "during apprehension, chase, confrontation or while in custody in cruisers" minimizes some of these crimes.  Let the people decide whether they think the right action was taken in these incidents.
 * 2) The fact that whites were pulled from their cars and beaten is no more sensationalistic than any of the other facts in this article. People should be made aware that whites were specifically targeted for violence by the rioters.  Whether you like it or not, it is factually accurate.  Also, in regards to your third statement, maybe the whites that resisted arrest did not do so in the ways that some of these 15 dead criminals did.  Not everyone who resists arrest shoots at officers of lunges at them with a knife.  I don't know the circumstances of every white person's resitance to arrest, but there are degrees of resistance.  I bet that if a white man shot at police he would be killed too.  In fact I think I saw it once on Cops.
 * 3) People should be made aware that Jeffery Irons was killed after grabbing an sergeant's gun and shooting another officer. Leaving it at "struggling with police" downplays the life threatening situation that the officers were in.--Monstertrucker 29 October 2006


 * Sorry edit summary was incorrect per revert. It was due to my error in oversight.  Seicer  (talk) (contribs) 03:03, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Sorry if my posting is creating problems, I am new to contributing to Wikipedia.--Monstertrucker 29 October 2006


 * No prob :) I sent you a welcome note to your talk page; drop me a line if you have any questions!  Seicer  (talk) (contribs) 03:34, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

If you would like to balance the information that's one thing, but the way it was inserted was uncomfortable & some of the language used was sensational. If you feel there are parts of this which are sensationalized please point them out or change them to be less sensational.
 * 1) The details to how & why the Black males were killed by the cops isn't all that relevent. The current tone used is not putting the blame on the cops or the but does explain the reaction of the riotors & the tension in the city between Black & White races. It is clear the rioters did blame them.
 * 2) There were non-Whites that were also pulled from their car. The statement they made yells of "Get Whitey" & other information is sensationalistic. The information about the attack was included, reduced in tone, & the indictment info was balanced with the resulting info about no conviction
 * 3) What is the importance about how Jeffrey Irons died? Owensby has an entire article dedicated to how he died because the information is relevent but doesn't need to be here. When considering the background of the tension Irons' death was a sidenote in comparison to the effect the Owensby incident had on the riots. --Duemellon 00:32, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I believe that the article as it stands now is more balanced than it had been. What I was struck by when I read it was a lack of background regarding the circumstances of the shootings and lack of info on what took place during the actual riots. There was a lot of info on the trials of the officers and the boycott which is very useful and if you notice I did not change anything about those. All facets of this story are important and deserve to be covered.
 * 1) I think that readers will find the circumstances of the police shootings relevant and will be able to form their own opinions on the actions taken by the police. When one says resisting arrest, people might be shocked that the suspect was killed.  But when it is reported that they were shooting at officers, they may see the police actions as justified.  I do not object to your wording, but I feel that readers should have access to more information if they wish, so I added a reference note to a story in the Enquirer about the 15 shooting victims which I feel does not pass judgement but merely reports the facts.
 * 2) I want to thank you for completing the information on the indictment with the fact that no on was convicted. I was unable to find a source for that, but I thought that readers should know that there were felony indictments, and the reference also summarizes some of the violence. This was a good resolution to this point.
 * 3) I do not necessarily believe that the Irons info is important at all. I would rather not mention the incident.  But if it is to be mentioned, it should not be that he was merely resisting arrest.  This may leave readers again wondering about the circumstances and I feel that the fact that he shot an officer places this outside of the description resisting arrest.
 * 4)Again, my problems with this article did not concern the facts that were presented, but the facts that were missing. People from outside of our area are probably not aware of the background incidents and the events during the riot itself.  As they will rely on this article to give them the total picture and probably not go hunting around the internet for 5 year old articles, I think that they should get all of the information in this article.  As there is a background section, it should include all the background information, the same should apply to the sections on the riots and the aftermath.  I believe that now the goal of a comprehensive information source on the riots has been achieved.Monstertrucker 01:49, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

From my view, it's not about whether or not the riots are justified, but these are the reasons why those people rioted & the reasons for the tension. --Duemellon 12:46, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you that it is very important to know the reasons why they rioted and the reasons for tensions in this city. I also believe it is important to know why the police acted as they did, right or wrong, and what happened during the riots. This presents the complete story and both sides are shown, correctly, to have behaved badly. Whether intended or not, people are going to pass judgement as they read, so they should have the benefit of all the information. I don't feel that adding factual, related information to any story is a negative thing as it only enhances the reader's understanding of the events described. Monstertrucker 15:55, 31 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I felt that this article was not very clear or NPOV maybe, and am in the process of esentially rewriting it. When done, I will give a link for discussion. Also, references should be fixed, not the list of outside links being the main thing.--Dumarest 13:44, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm confused about how it's important to include why the police had people die in their custody &/r confrontation? Is it to show they acted nobly or according to their policies? It was cited later there were no convictions for the police, which would mean they followed the procedures or were never cited as NOT following. I'm wondering why something that is clear when reading must be restated that way. --Duemellon 15:03, 1 November 2006 (UTC)


 * 1)I'm confused about why you are continuing to complain about the addition of factual information to this article. Why should readers only be informed about how the police acted, but be left guessing as to how the criminals acted?  The last sentence under background says "despite all the situations which led to the deaths of the young black males, no police were ever found guilty through any civil or criminal trials".  Not only are those situations never described, but this sentence also makes it sound like you think they should have been because of the use of the word despite.  Let the reader decide whether they think that the decisions were right or wrong based on the facts.  What could possibly be wrong with that?
 * 2)Remember, Cincinnati had three officers killed by blacks in the 4 years leading up to the riots. Where is the information on them in this article?  Readers should also know more about the violent actions of the rioters which only get about 3 sentences in this entire article that is supposed to be about the riots.  I'm wondering why an article about riots only devotes about 1/10 of its space to the actual riots.--Monstertrucker 18:33, 1 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Hear hear. That is why I am looking at a full redo, this article is on the riots, not a catch all for police/citizens differences. --Dumarest 19:10, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

1) The detail to what the police did in the deaths of the Black males is about equal to what the cops did, in exception of Owensby & Thomas. It didn't say how the people died in custody. It didn't say which ones were criminals, which ones were shot, or hit, or left to die, etc. It only said they died while in the polices' custody. It's pretty darn bland if you ask me. If you really really want to detail each incident they should be spawned off as subarticles somewhere else. In no way has this article said the police killed them unlawfully, unjustly, or mercilessly. The fact is, they died in police custody, during pursuit, &/r confrontations. No blame, no other details.

2) There's only detail on Owensby & Thomas, Caton & Jorg, & Roach, in this article. The balance you're seeking is an imbalance because that's all being talked about. Owensby's trial coincided with Thomas' death, which was the fuel for the fire.

3) Details about the riots are sketchy. The only information I have is from personal knowledge & such. The buildup, the results, & legacy, are things that are sourced. If you have some sources about actions in the riots, please do so from a credible source. The riots are much more than those 2 nights & to treat them as just those 2 nights would be terribly discourteous. --Duemellon 20:08, 1 November 2006 (UTC)


 * All I seek is a full reporting of the facts that led to the tensions in this city and which eventually spawned the riots. As you said yourself, the riots are much more than just those 2 nights.  Because the 15 deaths were used as justification by the rioters, details of those deaths deserve examination.  Perhaps the imbalance that you think I am seeking is really just a reporting of the facts as they actually occurred.  I'd be happy to provide details on the riots themselves from sources like CNN and the Enquirer if they will not be painted as being sensationalistic and unfair to the rioters.--Monstertrucker 22:15, 1 November 2006 (UTC)


 * There are also a good amount of pictures that the Enquirer took during the riots of the rioters, the police and the damage. If I can figure out how to do it I think it would be good to add some of these too so people can visualize what happened.--Monstertrucker 22:31, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Detailing the 15 deaths is not necessary and only will provide a distraction to the point of this article. Currently their deaths are being handled appropriately. There is no blame, no trials, no fingerpointing. The information is very bland & matter-of-factly. It says, as the fact is, they died while in custody, pursuit, and/or confrontation, with the police. No explanation for fault, or sensationalization of the circumstances. If you want to detail them I strongly suggest you make a spinoff article for them instead. The information you seek to add as background is getting too detailed to be practical as we could then start talking about the entire history of race riots in Cincy, economic demographics, when our 1st Black politicians were, individual murders, the Sentinels, etc etc.

As for getting pics from the Enquirer, that won't happen. It's copyrighted material. If you want to provide links, go ahead, but you can't include them here. --Duemellon 11:25, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Full rewrite
I have watched this page for some time, and a few months ago wanted to do a full rewrite. Now that is has been at leas partially divided and some of the 'stuff' is in other pages, I would like to do that full rewrite again, but it will mean greatly modifying this page and others, and I do not know how I can do that in a way that my rewrite of more than one page can be done and evaluated by 'the world' [i.e. you commentators] before it is placed in place of the current pages. Help!! How can I do this.--Dumarest 20:58, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

What I know is you simply drop it in. Start a discussion & see what happens. Keep it factual because there will be people who disagree. Now, if you run into a dispute as to which facts to display (if both are valid, or are competiting) then include them both in the article in a relevent & smooth way. This does not include apologetic or irrelevent details. --Duemellon 23:04, 15 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I have considered in the past a 'temp' page or pages, for discussion, and eventually moving to the real thing if discussion approves. --Dumarest 14:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Neutrality DIspute
Removed tag. If you believe it's POV please provide specific examples. A general complaint is not actionable. --Duemellon 11:41, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Howdy from the External Links Wikiproject
Hello all, I wandered over here following the tag. I've never even heard of this incident before, so I claim to be fairly neutral. Anyhow, I'm going to start to go through and fix up the main problem from my end, which is that articles that should be inline citations affixed to facts are instead listed in a rather formidable external links section. While I do that, I'll try to remove non-neutral language and fix up grammar and all that. Thank you to whoever put those links into categories, that will make this task much much easier. Just wanted to say hello to the editors who have obviously put a lot of time into this article and let y'all know what I'm doing. --Gimme danger 16:41, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Civil trial v. Roach & Cincinnati
*Statement From Alicia Reece – WCPO-TV
 * City settles 16 police suits for $4.5 million – Cincinnati Enquirer
 * Leisure sues Reeces over offer – Cincinnati Enquirer
 * Leisure sues Reeces over offer – Cincinnati Enquirer
 * May 8: Leisure Tapes – WCPO-TV (Deadlinks, not available on the internet archive DigitalC (talk) 19:31, 6 December 2009 (UTC))

Strange Article, was there even a riot?
I am trying to research the riots where people were destroying their community while attacking people of different races. Instead there is 8 sentences about the riot, and 8 pages about police officers killing armed gangsters in the line of duty. Can we make 2 pages, one that has the police officer trials, and one about the riot?


 * Armed gangsters? You can't be serious. The riots were a direct reaction to three deaths, and the third that hardly gets mentioned is because the community had no problem with it actually. Owensby and Thomas were not "gangsters". Owensby was a veteran who was mistaken for another man and died in the process of arrest and Thomas was guilty of nothing more than traffic tickets. Honestly, your tone is absolutely racist - so please don't make edits if that's how you see things. I surely hoped you are blocked from making changes to this article. JoeHenzi (talk) 02:23, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Deaths
Much bs info in the "article" but it the question remains open: How many died in the riots? --188.23.73.236 (talk) 15:31, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

New Links to Look At / Malkin's Link
First, I removed the link to the Michelle Malkin article. I would also like to remove or have removed the link to the "Ascendancy" article. Both are opinion pieces and both are written by people far removed from the events of the riots, what caused them, etc. You really can't find more biased articles. I can only suggest that people try searching for information at Cincinnati.com or by looking at the Cincinnati station's archives at sites for WCPO, WKRC, WXIX, or WCET. As for the events leading up to the Timothy Thomas shooting, which were certainly more influential than Owensby I would suggest looking at the following link (it actually has statistics, quotes from police);


 * http://www.citybeat.com/cincinnati/article-6644-news-ticket-to-die.html

CityBeat is also a good resource if you can find articles prior to and during April 2001.

I would hope that we could get some editors on this outside of Cincinnati and those who are not racially motivated - because that seems to be where all the bias comes. I, personally, won't edit this article other than removing blatant things like the link to Malkin's opinion piece because while I want to have a NPOV stance my blood pressure would skyrocket once I get into the surrounding arguments. I'm just trying to be honest. The issue has been politicized enough and after 10 years we should stop with it and just report the facts or remove the article. JoeHenzi (talk) 02:46, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Criminal Record of Thomas - Totally made up.
Thomas was 19 when he died and there is a slight chance that some of the information in the portion below, that I removed, could be from when he was a minor - but that is sealed so I would only wonder who made those edits and how they got that information. I can't find a reference for any of this and in fact, the reference provided hardly mentions his traffic violations. It's a discussion/interview piece. Honestly - this is the worst cited article on Wikipedia in my opinion. I've seen hoax articles that have better and believable sources. I said I wouldn't edit, but this is factually wrong;
 * Thomas had 59 misdemeanor charges, which led to 14 open warrants for his arrest. Most of the charges were non-violent, but did include 2 counts of minor assault. The charges included parking tickets, not wearing a seatbelt, loitering, as well as running from police. | NOTE, the reference article mentions none of this, and no where in the news does it appear that Thomas has a criminal record outside of his traffic violations.

Neither in 2001 or today was there anything in the news about these charges of "minor assault" and all were non-violent, not "most". He was certainly guilty of repeated traffic offenses, but until someone can link his rap sheet, I can't see how this should be included as it's unproven. JoeHenzi (talk) 03:10, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!


 * http://www.cincypost.com/2001/mar/14/suit031401.html
 * In 2001 Cincinnati riots on 2011-05-25 07:08:15, Socket Error: 'A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond'
 * In 2001 Cincinnati riots on 2011-06-10 06:58:37, Socket Error: 'A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond'

--JeffGBot (talk) 06:59, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

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