Cincinnati's police chief told Council's Law and Public Safety Committee Monday about his plans to reassign 24 officers to patrol duties to combat an increase of shootings in the city.
Chief Jeffrey Blackwell said until recently shootings had decreased.
“As of today we’ve had 316 fatal and non-fatal shootings,” Blackwell said. “Last year at this time we had 239. Two years ago we had 298. We’re still down two percent in homicides while other cities are up 30 to 50 percent including Baltimore, Washington, D.C. and Cleveland.”
The latest officer reassignments are a continuation of the chief’s safety initiative plan launched earlier this summer.
“We’re going to put them directly in District 4, District 2, and two of the officers in District 1 where we’ve seen some spikes that have stayed up,” Blackwell said.
Blackwell said the additional officers will let district captains do more creative things to address crime hot spots.
