Self-Defense Is Legal in Cincinnati

This incident occured in April, but the local media stopped covering it once it was clear that the DA was going to rule self-defense. I've included a link to one of the news stories (so called) below the link to the video, but the video is really the point.

There is security camera video from two perspectives.

Hartwell is one of the 52 neighborhoods in Cincinnat.

This is the Active Self Protection video ASP Viewer WRECKS Armed Robber. Embedding of the video is forbidden, because it is age-restricted. It is 16 minutes long.

Here is a typical news story from WCPO, the Cincinnati affiliate of ABC. Police: 40-year-old dead after shooting in Hartwell

Cincinnati police said District 4 officers responded to De Camp Avenue at around 4 a.m. for a reported person shot. When they arrived, they found Robert Andrews, 40, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds.

Three local media outlets covered the story before the video came out, because gun violence is all they care about.

Self-defense is a human right, and it might just be your legal right in Ohio.

Self-Defense Is Legal in Cincinnati

And the DA Hates that. Charges dropped in Fountain Square shooting after self-defense claim

This shooting took place in October of last year. It took until this week for a judge to dismiss the charges with prejudice. There was video of the incident.

Now, he was under "disability" meaning that he was not supposed to be in possession of a firearm.

He shot 2 people, who he claimed were about to shoot him. The DA charged him with felonious assault, and improper discharge of a firearm.

"The charges against my client were dismissed with prejudice because after reviewing the internal video from City Bird, it was crystal clear my client acted in self-defense," said Clyde Bennett, Ferguson's defense attorney. "This is what I said from the beginning that my client acted in self-defense."

Now any video reviewed by the judge in the case, was available to the District Attorney's office. But DAs, HATE self-defense, especially in Blue Cities like Cincinnati.

Fountain Square is in the heart of downtown Cincinnati.

The defendant faces other charges, so he is not out of the woods, but he won't face these charges.

And the Hamilton County DA not withstanding, self-defense is a human right, and might just be a legal right in Ohio.

DAs Hate Self-Defense

From Cincinnati's The Enquirer. 'He chose to live': Jury finds youth football coach shot parent in self-defense at game

Lamont Ragan, 30, was found not guilty at the end of a trial in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court on Aug. 25. He faced numerous charges, including attempted murder.

Mr. Ragan was a coach for a youth football team of 11 and 12-year-old players. Ka’ron Booker was shot after the game, and exhibition match, on 24 October 2024.

That the DA took the case to trial is not surprising, but there was one reaction that caught my attention. Well, the fact that this was so close to home, though I haven't been into the city of Cincinnati in many years. (I just never drive that far south.) From WKRC we get Local youth football coach found not guilty in shooting at game.

Shortly after the shooting, Pastor Peterson Mingo, whose step-grandson was hurt, said "Who would bring a gun to a youth event of peewee football?"

This is the kind of thing that startles people who do not conceal and carry. Do you only wear seat belts on the days you expect to be in an accident? When will you meet a violent threat of robbery or carjacking or what have you? Do you buy fire extinguishers only on the day before you expect a fire, or when you first move into a new home?

But then these people who seem to think that they can predict the future are sure that you will never have to protect yourself. Or they can tell you how many rounds you will need to defend yourself, should that situation arise.

Is Cincinnati PD the New Chicago PD?

In other words, is it completely insane, riddled with corruption, and spending money without regard for anything? Though in Chicago's case, the excess spending is more about insane amounts of overtime right now.

Cincinnati is not really a big city. It is only the third-largest city in Ohio, behind Cleveland and Columbus. You know about Cincinnati because of the pro sports teams, The Reds, and The Bengals. (What is the third largest city in Indiana, or in Nebraska?) $500,000 is a lot of money for a city the size of Cincinnati.

The police chief has decided that instead of honoring a business decision to send all 5-year-old service weapons back to Smith and Wesson for a discount on their replacements, they will instead destroy all of the service weapons, and buy new. I'm not sure why they think service weapons, most of which get used only at their yearly qualification (I'm assuming that Cincinnati PD has to do a yearly firearm qualification - I know it is dangerous to do so) need to be replaced every 5 years, but then I'm not a bureaucrat, and I know a little about firearms.

This is the Liberty Doll video Activist Cops Cost Taxpayers $500K

On the subject of Cincinnati Police she has the following to say:

People that have no problem enforcing unconstitutional laws, that arrest journalists for filming crime scenes, that arrested people for not social distancing in 2020, have officers drunk driving with expired plates, people dying of stab wounds during SWAT raids, arrest people for filming them during arrests, and also allegedly threatening to shoot them for filming, have officers involved in Narcotics money laundering schemes at nightclubs, and have 56-year-old officers using the police data system to get the phone numbers of 19-year-old women, are talking about not trading in their Department weapons and choosing to spend an extra $500,000 of taxpayer money because they're worried about "moral consistency."

Liberty Doll has the receipts for all of those instances. Watch the video.

Who Thought that Airbnb Was a Good Idea?

You can't use your Airbnb to throw a party. It says so in the agreement. Really. Fatal shooting near UC happened at house rented as Airbnb

Just like you can't rob, or steal, or do drugs. Those are against the law. You also can't speed, or buy things online without paying sales tax, though they apparently closed the door on that last one.

The homeowner says she went to the house around 9:40 p.m. because she had a “bad feeling” and found what looked like a party with more than 20 people of all ages present.

She says she stayed outside for about an hour before going down the block to ask police to help shut down the party.

As for the Airbnb policy...

According to Airbnb policy, renters are not allowed to throw parties.

Which apparently doesn't mean anything.

One person died. One person who was shot walked to the University of Cincinnati Medical Center. One person was taken by car to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital.

The homeowner says many of the things in the home were broken but says she wishes she had stopped the party sooner.

So tell me again how Airbnb is such a good idea.

He Wasn't Shot Because He Was Trespassing

But you have to get to the very end of the story before they admit that. Police: Homeowner shoots suspected trespasser in Colerain

He faces trespassing and menacing charges.

Menacing means he was a threat, which is why the homeowner was not arrested.

The homeowners didn't know him and they shot him as they investigated noises coming from the back part of their home.

The guy who got shot ran away, but cops found him and took him to the hospital and then to jail.

It remains to be seen if the DA will agree that self-defense is legal in Cincinnati. Self-defense is a human-right.

Self-defense is Legal in Cincinnati

I thought it was, but you can never be sure today. Police: NKU law student was shot in self defense

Police have said the preliminary investigation shows that the shooter acted in self-defense. The Prosecutor's office is still reviewing the case.

Cierra Allen died at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center.

Self-defense is a human-right.

Violence is Not Equally Distributed in Cincinnati

This is really not a new phenomenon. Neighborhoods that had a high crime rate, are seeing a disproportionate rise in crime. Westwood, Over-the-Rhine and Walnut Hills lead in Cincinnati assaults

Westwood, Over-the-Rhine and Walnut Hills account for one of every four aggravated assaults in Cincinnati so far this year.

Together, those three neighborhoods have seen a 73% increase in aggravated assaults over last year. The city’s 52 neighborhoods overall have seen an increase of about 5%.

Of course they blame the guns, and not the people weilding them. Because to blame the people would be hard. And probably politically incorrect.

The pandemic can’t be blamed, either. Aggravated assaults in Westwood, Over-the-Rhine and Walnut Hills are significantly higher compared not only to last year but also to the average of the previous three years.

The breakdown of civilization is proceeding.

13-year-old Ohio Girl Stabbed to Death - No Police Intervention

Are we supposed to believe that this outcome is better than what happened in Columbus? Friends, family gather to remember 13-year-old stabbed to death in Winton Hills. Nyaira Givens was her name.

Winton Hills is a neighborhood in Cincinnati.

Police believe a 13-year-old girl, whom Nyaira knew, stabbed her. She died in Jackson's arms as the family waited for help to arrive. During the vigil, Jackson held a picture of Nyaira in his arms.

In the insane moment of the day, Bree Newsome, prominent BLM activist, said that cops should just let the knife fights play out. She said that on Twitter and when the blow-back got intense she made her account private (or protected in Twtter-speak). BLM activist says police shouldn't use a weapon to stop someone from getting stabbed

Bree Newsome said that "Teenagers have been having fights including fights involving knives for eons. We do not need police to address these situations."

I wonder if Ms. Newsome would like to talk to the parents of the 13-year-old who was stabbed to death. I'm sure she can convince them it is for the best.

Her take was that anyone who calls police to the scene of a knife fight is the one that needs help, and she means that "sincerely." For Newsome, police being called to a knife fight is nothing but white supremacy.

Thank the gods there was none of that in Cincinnati. Or something.

It is at times like these that I am reminded of William Butler Yeats' poem "The Second Coming" and the phrase...

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

The full text will be in the comments.

The Brent Spence Bridge

The Brent Spence Bridge links Cincinnati with northern Kentucky. It is a double-decker truss bridge that carries Interstates 71 and 75 across the Ohio River, connecting Cincinnati and Covington, Kentucky.

It is also a major north-south transport corridor through this part of the world. I-75 carries traffic headed south from Detroit. I-71 links Cincinnati with Cleveland. I-74 carries truck traffic from Indianapolis, and merges with I-75 a short distance north of the bridge. I-75 and I-71 merge at the southbound entrance to the bridge. Heading south, I-75 heads to Lexington, Chattanooga and Atlanta. I-71 carries traffic to Louisville and Nashville.

And there is a lot of truck traffic. There are enough trucks that the American Transportation Research Institute lists it as number 7 on their Top 100 Truck Bottlenecks - 2020 list. Though that may be in part due to the endless maintenance on the highways through Cincinnati that has been going on the past few years.

The photo above is of the Cincinnati Skyline as seen from Kentucky. The bridge in the lower left-hand-corner is the Brent Spence Bridge. Covington, Kentucky is the city on the near shore of the river, with Cincinnati in the background. The 2nd bridge, working left to right, is a railroad bridge. The photo, via WikiMedia Commons, is by Rick Dikeman. Click on the image for a larger view, and more details.

The photo below shows a closer view of the bridge, also as seen from Kentucky. The red brick building on the far shore is the old B & O Freight Terminal in Cincinnati. That image, by Antony-22, was captured in 2018. Click on the image for a larger view and more details at WikiMedia Commons.

On November 11th at just before 3 AM, there was a crash on the lower deck of the bridge. A truck jackknifed and was hit by another truck, which was carrying 110 pounds of potassium hydroxide and a large amount of diesel fuel. The fire burned for 2 hours and was hot enough to deform the steel in part of the bridge and damage concrete of the upper deck. That closed the bridge, and briefly closed the river to barge traffic. While the river has reopened, the bridge remains closed. Well, mostly closed. One lane of the northbound bridge was reopened with reduced speeds, but I don't believe semitrailers are permitted at this time.

Before the accident, more than 150,000 vehicles per day used the bridge.

The background on the bridge and its deteriorating state comes from a source I don't like, but they seem to be complete. The infrastructure disaster nobody is talking about.

Built in 1963 to accommodate three lanes of traffic in each direction on its two decks, engineers in the 1980s decided to eliminate the shoulders and narrow the lanes to 11 feet so that four lanes of traffic can travel in each direction. Drivers experience a harrowing four lanes of heavy traffic at high speed followed by a messy interchange. Such a crash was inevitable (and probably avoidable) on the bridge that federal inspectors have deemed "functionally obsolete" since the 1990s.

"Functionally Obsolete" doesn't refer to its state of maintenance, but the fact that it handles more traffic than it was designed to handle, and it does not have things like shoulders or any way for emergency vehicles to pass traffic in the event of an accident. Though if you look at the larger version of the 2nd photo, you might think that maintenance has been ignored. You would probably not be wrong.

If you look at a map of this part of the world the state line separating Ohio and Kentucky is the river, but it isn't in the middle of the river. It is very close to the Ohio shoreline. This means that Kentucky really owns the bridge, or most of it anyway, and various parts of downstate Kentucky are not excited about paying for what they see as northern Kentucky's bridge. Ohio has a vested interest of course, and there would even be federal dollars available to aid in replacing the bridge, if the region could come up with a funding plan. And while they started buying some property a few years back to prepare for replacement of the bridge, that has been stuck in limbo for a while now.

And it doesn't help that Kentucky, thanks to its insane approach to pensions, is mostly bankrupt, or on the way... State’s generosity in pension benefits now coming home to roost during pandemic

The pension plan for state workers in non-hazardous jobs plummeted from more than 120 percent of the funding levels needed to fulfill its obligations in 1999 to less than 14 percent in 2019.

Marypat of STUMP, thinks that 80% is not a valid funding level, not in 2019, after years of a booming economy. A 14% funding level is insane.

Of course an obvious choice is to make the bridge a toll-bridge. But the usual suspects are upset about that because it will hurt the poor and people of color. I don't know how they will be helped if the bridge is left until it collapses, but then I am not woke.

And so we have another piece of vital infrastructure, that is left to decay.

UPDATE: Brent Spence reopens to traffic. That was 2:30 PM on December 22nd.