Last year, people thought crime was getting out of hand when a man was raped at gunpoint on Probasco. Since then, the campus police have had their powers increased, the jurisdiction of campus police was expanded to include all areas one mile from campus, and crime still remains a problem.
At 1:30 in the morning of Saturday, September third, several friends and I left an apartment on Riddle road and found the intersection of Martin Luther King and Clifton occupied by nine squad cars of both Cincinnati and Campus Police, a police S.U.V., a fire truck, an ambulance, and a garbage truck. The focus of this spectacle was on a small white two-door sedan and its occupants. The driver was speaking to an officer, while several other policemen surrounded the car.
Curious about all the commotion, my friends and I paused on a small hill in Burnet woods alongside Clifton Ave. Several moments passed by, and the driver was led to the rear of the S.U.V. A few minutes more and the stretcher was rolled out of the back of the ambulance and placed near the white sedan. A police cruiser blocked the view of the stretcher. Two paramedics removed a large object from the car and placed it on the stretcher, covering it with a white sheet and returned the stretcher to the back of the ambulance. The ambulance remained parked, while the officers and paramedics talked to each other for some minutes. Then suddenly, as if a signal had been given, all returned to their vehicles and dispersed. My friends and I returned home, puzzled.
The next morning, we scanned the local newspapers and the U.C. department of Public Safety’s website and crime list server but there was no mention of the previous nights incident. All that had happened last night, according to the newspapers, was that a man in walnut hills was shot in his car, some two miles away.
A few more days passed, and I had an opportunity to speak to a couple of University Police Officers. I asked them if they knew what happened that night. Neither of the two knew anything about it. When I asked if a disturbance that size was noteworthy, the officer replied with “You’d be surprised how often these sorts of things happen.” He told me that the University department of Public Safety keeps records of its activity and suggested I contact the department.
However, the department of Records did not reply to any queries and the events of the early morning of September third remain a mystery. It is a strange world when an incident so obviously noteworthy can simply go un-noted. If an event involving at least ten police officers is not uncommon, imagine what sort of disturbance would be considered extraordinary!
If you would like to contact the U.C. Department of Public Safety, it can be reached at 556-3911 or by e-mail at ucpd@uc.edu.