Speaker 1: Billy cunning him the Great America. Welcome this Tuesday afternon
Speaker 1: the Triesteate. Great things are going on, I hope, and
Speaker 1: I've done some copious research. When the Bengals went to
Speaker 1: the super Bowl at the nine games, they were five
Speaker 1: and four, went to the super Bowl. Right now they're
Speaker 1: two and four. But if and when they beat the
Speaker 1: Steelers on Thursday, there's three and four, then at home
Speaker 1: against the Jester, four and four. Then the Bears at
Speaker 1: home they're five and four with Joe Flacco leading the away.
Speaker 2: With Ted McKay.
Speaker 1: So if the Bengals are five and four, they're going
Speaker 1: to the super Bowl because the Bills aren't that good
Speaker 1: and Kansas City can be beaten, I think. But until then,
Speaker 1: we have major problems in River City. And once again
Speaker 1: there's massive shootouts on Fountain Square headline on Channel five
Speaker 1: last night. Five people shot in less than eight hours
Speaker 1: across Cincinnati Hambleton County, And of course Shari Poelo had
Speaker 1: the story with the Power of five and Shari Poelo,
Speaker 1: welcome again to the Bill Cunningham Show. And first of all, Shari,
Speaker 1: I want to ask you some fundamental questions. Are you
Speaker 1: prepared for some questions I think so ten or fifteen
Speaker 1: years ago. You might recall memories go back that long
Speaker 1: that my wife was on Common Police Court bench and
Speaker 1: she would receive messages at eight o'clock emails from the
Speaker 1: Sheriff's office saying we're accepting no prisoners today, and every
Speaker 1: Common Police Court judgementicipal court judge in Hemlinic County would
Speaker 1: get an eight o'clock wake up call saying, don't sentence
Speaker 1: anybody to the jail were packed, and so the next
Speaker 1: day the same thing would go on.
Speaker 2: The next day, the same thing would go on.
Speaker 1: And so side Lease and Joe Deeters put together a
Speaker 1: proposal for the voters to decide whether to build a
Speaker 1: second Hamley County jail, to put another thousand beds in
Speaker 1: Hamlty County because of the criminal activity that was going on,
Speaker 1: and it was voted down fifty three to forty seven.
Speaker 1: The people said, we don't want to, we don't want
Speaker 1: to spend I don't know it was like eighty million
Speaker 1: dollars to build a second Hemlic County jail. So the
Speaker 1: resolution to that was quit arresting people. Here we are
Speaker 1: ten to fifteen years later, and guess what, According to
Speaker 1: Judge Josh Berkowitz, the presiding judge and heimin County Municipal Court.
Speaker 1: There's four hundred empty beds in the Hammer County jail
Speaker 1: as I speak, four hundred beds are empty. So you
Speaker 1: can only imagine if we would have built another thousand
Speaker 1: beds somewhere in Queensgate, we'd have fourteen hundred empty beds.
Speaker 2: Now, the question is this, is there's so.
Speaker 1: Little crime in the city of Cincinnati happening now that
Speaker 1: all of a sudden the criminal element, which ages out
Speaker 1: about the age of thirty, have quit committing crimes. That
Speaker 1: somehow there's not shootouts, somehow there's not car breakings, somehow
Speaker 1: there's not warns out for arrest. Suddenly, all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: forty percent of the so called criminal populace, whoever they are,
Speaker 1: have quit committing crimes. Or is it a case of
Speaker 1: city police not arresting judges, no cash bonds, and a
Speaker 1: permissive restorative justice attitude, Which is it shri palelo, as
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, we're now crime free in Cincinnati?
Speaker 2: Is that what's going on?
Speaker 3: Sadly, I think you and I both know the answer that,
Speaker 3: and I remember what you're talking about. I remember sitting
Speaker 3: in and interviewing Siweez about this issue and him wanting
Speaker 3: to build another jail, and of course that's not popular
Speaker 3: and glamorous. Nobody wants to spend you know, city and
Speaker 3: county dollars on that. But of course that's not the case,
Speaker 3: and we're seeing it night in and night out. You know,
Speaker 3: I definitely think it's unfortunately become and we hear it
Speaker 3: all the time, a revolving door where you get these
Speaker 3: people who many of them, I can't tell you how
Speaker 3: many times. Even the victims who we put on the
Speaker 3: news who are shot and killed typically or stabbed to death,
Speaker 3: the victims' pictures that we get are month shots because
Speaker 3: they oftentimes are involved in criminal activity. And so unfortunately,
Speaker 3: again we talk about, well, okay, do we need more
Speaker 3: police officers, do we need the state to help to
Speaker 3: help out? Let me let me just for the people
Speaker 3: who don't follow this as closely as you do, and
Speaker 3: I do really, Let me just take people back in
Speaker 3: the last week, six days ago, so a week ago today,
Speaker 3: we had a guy shot in the finger of the hand.
Speaker 3: He was in a car, gotten some sort of argument.
Speaker 3: He was shot right near Fountain Square, right there at Walnut.
Speaker 3: This is during rush hour. People were literally running because
Speaker 3: they're leaving work, walking around Fountain Square hearing gunshots and
Speaker 3: they're running to their cars or running back into work.
Speaker 3: Here we are a week later, last night, seven point
Speaker 3: thirty City Bird Fountain Square again before the sun goes down.
Speaker 3: It is packed. There are people in restaurants. This is
Speaker 3: literally right across the street from Jeff Ruby's, right next
Speaker 3: door to other restaurants that are filled with people getting
Speaker 3: something to eat. And these guys again, let's see a
Speaker 3: sixteen to seventeen year old grazed by a bullet at
Speaker 3: an adult shot in the thigh. Two people we know
Speaker 3: are in custody. But let me just tell you there
Speaker 3: were two officers nearby on Fountain Square. There were two
Speaker 3: excuse me, there were two on Fountain Square, two more
Speaker 3: nearby and other officers at Government Square. So to sit
Speaker 3: there last night, they were where are the police? Well,
Speaker 3: the police were there. They responded immediately. In fact, thank goodness,
Speaker 3: they were there because they were able to track down
Speaker 3: two people who they think were involved in are now
Speaker 3: in custody. But that's just last night. One incident. We
Speaker 3: had a shooting in Westwood an hour earlier, one person died.
Speaker 3: Still waiting on the information about the victims specifically right
Speaker 3: now they're searching for a car that they think is
Speaker 3: connected to Blue Tesla. Then they're late last night West End,
Speaker 3: eleven year old young guy shot in the leg at
Speaker 3: an apartment ends up running to a fire station for help. Overnight,
Speaker 3: we have a guy arrives at Mercy Health along Queen City.
Speaker 3: He was shot, expected to survive. So, just as you
Speaker 3: said in the last in eight hours across the Hamilton
Speaker 3: County we had five people shot. Two of them if
Speaker 3: you count the one grade was at Fountain Square. But
Speaker 3: then we had the same thing happened nearby at Fountain
Speaker 3: Square a week earlier. The chief is out there last night. She's,
Speaker 3: of course saying all of the right things. We can't
Speaker 3: tolerate this. We've got a statement from the mayor. I mean,
Speaker 3: but again, here's what it is, Lilli, and you, I
Speaker 3: think hit the nail on the head. There has to
Speaker 3: be more of a deterrent. It's like when you parent kids.
Speaker 3: And I remember years ago when I had one of
Speaker 3: my boys was kind of hanging with the row the crowd,
Speaker 3: and you know, I would say, if you get in trouble.
Speaker 3: You're you know, if you do this, you're going to
Speaker 3: get in trouble. If you do this, you're going to
Speaker 3: get in trouble. And I wasn't really following through. And
Speaker 3: then finally I dropped the hammer, right. I called every
Speaker 3: parent who I thought their kid was involved and said, listen,
Speaker 3: this happened on my watch. It's my son's, you know, responsibility,
Speaker 3: it's my responsibility.
Speaker 2: Guess what.
Speaker 3: All of his friends were suddenly mad at him, alienated him.
Speaker 3: We never had a problem again. But leading up to it,
Speaker 3: I was being soft. I didn't want him to you know,
Speaker 3: I didn't want his friends to be mad at him.
Speaker 3: I didn't want to be the bad guy, right, And
Speaker 3: I liken it to what we're seeing right now. If
Speaker 3: right now, by the way, and I don't know if
Speaker 3: you've talked about this on your show. Back in I
Speaker 3: think it was May the House passed a Repeat Offender Act.
Speaker 3: It specifically in Ohio, targets people with prior violent felonies.
Speaker 3: It would increase prison term for any violent offender who
Speaker 3: has a gun after some sort of previous felony conviction. Well,
Speaker 3: where is it. It's sitting in the Senate right now.
Speaker 3: I mean that those are the people that you have
Speaker 3: to send a message. Even if you are involved in
Speaker 3: a violent crime that involves a gun, you're going to
Speaker 3: go to prison. You're not going to sit in the
Speaker 3: Hamilton County jail for one hundred and I don't know
Speaker 3: eighty days, whatever it is. Because right now, these gun
Speaker 3: offenses varied depending on you know, your criminal history and
Speaker 3: the offense, and they can range anywhere from a misdemeanor
Speaker 3: to a felony. So that's the problem. I mean, we
Speaker 3: unfortunately have people who continue to commit crimes, who are
Speaker 3: back out on the street immediately.
Speaker 1: In fact, the chiefs of police in Hamilty County got
Speaker 1: together about a month ago and said, we can't stand
Speaker 1: this anymore because we send people down in the justice center,
Speaker 1: they're out on no cash bonds, they're out committing more crimes.
Speaker 1: Before the paperwork is done, the criminal is out. Secondly,
Speaker 1: the mayor about a month ago had a big powwow
Speaker 1: with the governor and the FBI. The CIA was there,
Speaker 1: the ATF, the US Marshal Service, Prosecutor's Office, sheriff for
Speaker 1: everybody was there. We're going to bring in bringing the
Speaker 1: adults to help us so that we have availability of
Speaker 1: our cops to do more serious policing. And immediately Mayor
Speaker 1: iris Roli said that's not going to fly. She wasn't
Speaker 1: present for it. Scottie Johnson wasn't present for it. Lemon
Speaker 1: Kearney wasn't present for it, and they quickly told the
Speaker 1: mayor this is not gonna fly. In fact, lemon Kearney
Speaker 1: device mayor held news conferences saying we don't need these
Speaker 1: people here, and so the highway Patrol being here with
Speaker 1: all the state resources, was told not to come. The
Speaker 1: agreement says two ships a month, and ken Kober says
Speaker 1: they haven't arrived yet because the Mayor's not calling them
Speaker 1: and Mayor iris Roly doesn't want it.
Speaker 2: And so when there's no.
Speaker 1: Recognition that we don't need outside help, we got this.
Speaker 2: When they don't have this, where do you go with that?
Speaker 3: Well, exactly, and honestly, that was a huge dog and
Speaker 3: povie show. I think we all were like, Okay, this
Speaker 3: is showing some sort of improvement. We're all going to
Speaker 3: work together, We're going to get this help. We're going
Speaker 3: to be partnering up with with the FEDS, with our
Speaker 3: UH with with marshals hopefully they were saying they were
Speaker 3: going to be apprehending violent offenders. We're talking about people
Speaker 3: who are violating role post release. They're going to be
Speaker 3: you know, watching by air aerial supervision. But to be
Speaker 3: honest with you, Willie, then I heard when I looked
Speaker 3: closer at the agreement and we saw, oh what would
Speaker 3: be it said quote no more than two times a month.
Speaker 3: And as you said, I haven't heard of one time
Speaker 3: us working with them. And we had this huge news
Speaker 3: conference where it all you know, I mean, the news
Speaker 3: conference went on for well over an hour. It was,
Speaker 3: you know, everybody and their brother was there talking about this,
Speaker 3: how we're going to be walking together, working together. I've
Speaker 3: yet to hear anything about that. And again, but if
Speaker 3: you do that, the whole point of that was, Okay,
Speaker 3: if we bring in the FED, if we actually start
Speaker 3: charging some of these repeat offenders with federal charges instead
Speaker 3: of just state and local charges, then we're really going
Speaker 3: to lock them up and send them to prison. But
Speaker 3: guess what, Really, this is such a broader issue. I've
Speaker 3: done so many stories on even our prisons releasing these
Speaker 3: violent by I'm talking murderers and repeat offenders, violent offenders.
Speaker 3: We get money if we keep people here locally, so
Speaker 3: if we don't send him to the state prison. I mean,
Speaker 3: it's such a cycle, an endless cycle, that we're not addressing.
Speaker 1: Well, it's not only the mayor not having sufficient police resources.
Speaker 1: It's not only the mayor not accepting state help. Not
Speaker 1: only the mayor, the whole system. I look at Patrick
Speaker 1: Herringer and what they did with that to with Mordecai
Speaker 1: Blacks say he was released and then he butchers Patrick
Speaker 1: Herringer and Sarah is now and then Sarah was arrested
Speaker 1: for eight hours.
Speaker 2: I still have an explanation.
Speaker 1: How you arrest Sarah Herringer, put her in handcuffs leader
Speaker 1: outside the bloody our home of our bloody's husband. Body
Speaker 1: is lying in locker roup for eight hours. I have
Speaker 1: no idea. And then common police court judges collapse, the
Speaker 1: probation system in the outside of the city of Cincinnati
Speaker 1: collapse that system.
Speaker 2: And it's not just the.
Speaker 1: Mayorf to have pureval or Mayor Irish Rolli, whoever's in charge.
Speaker 1: It's the idea that Judge Kerry Bloom and Juvenile Court
Speaker 1: so far this year has bound over one felony is
Speaker 1: their sixteen and seventeen year old gang bangers with guns,
Speaker 1: hurting people, shooting people. One time has gone to common
Speaker 1: police court. It used to be a pipeline. If you
Speaker 1: use a gun and you're sixteen or seventeen, adult crime,
Speaker 1: adult crime. That problem needs to be fixed. And we
Speaker 1: have an election coming up in three weeks. I'd be shocked.
Speaker 1: I'd be shocked if the voters of Cincinnati said we
Speaker 1: can't take it anymore. And then you live in the
Speaker 1: Mason area. I see Procter and Gamble without making an announcement.
Speaker 1: Their employees are telling P and G, we don't want
Speaker 1: to come downtown, and so they're building a huge facility,
Speaker 1: expanding it in Mason, and they're telling employees, if you
Speaker 1: want to work from home, you're going to work from
Speaker 1: home because when you get out of work, you might
Speaker 1: be shot. And so incrementally, slowly downtown's going to hollow out.
Speaker 1: Does that concern you? Macy's is gone, They have apartments
Speaker 1: down there now. PNG would be a great apartment building complex.
Speaker 1: PNG Corporate America is deciding not to issue a press
Speaker 1: release that's bad for business. But quietly they're going to
Speaker 1: incrementally take jobs away.
Speaker 3: And I think Unfortunately a lot of people they don't
Speaker 3: want to hear it in many of our leaders and
Speaker 3: who are trying to do great work down there with
Speaker 3: the Chamber. I mean, look, we're building a brand new
Speaker 3: convention center where we're trying we're going to tell the country, hey,
Speaker 3: come here, hold your convention here. Well, if you can't
Speaker 3: go and get food downtown, if you can't walk to
Speaker 3: get a coffee and leave your hotel, and feel like,
Speaker 3: it's not going to be like it is in Chicago
Speaker 3: and other cities where you're afraid people aren't going to
Speaker 3: want to come here. And I've said that to so
Speaker 3: many of the leaders who talk to me and are like, sure,
Speaker 3: are you really afraid. Here's the truth. I will absolutely
Speaker 3: go down on a Sunday morning for a Bengals game.
Speaker 3: Of course I'm going to go to a red Skin.
Speaker 3: But I go down and I get out. I truly
Speaker 3: don't go down and go out on a Friday or
Speaker 3: Saturday night. I literally went down two weeks ago. My
Speaker 3: son goes to you, I told you, goes to the
Speaker 3: University of Cincinnati. My older son and he It was parents'
Speaker 3: weekend and some of the parents wanted to get together
Speaker 3: in OTR. I'm not kidding you, And I said, I
Speaker 3: was scared to death to park and walk, you know,
Speaker 3: one hundred feet to the bar. And I was, And
Speaker 3: I was even with Mike because I could just you know,
Speaker 3: you're you're kind of seeing the you know, people around
Speaker 3: that aren't going into the restaurants or the bars. They're
Speaker 3: just kind of wandering along the street. You feel like
Speaker 3: it's only it's not if, but when you're going to
Speaker 3: be in the wrong place at the wrong time. And
Speaker 3: that's the reality. When you have five people shot in
Speaker 3: a matter of eight hours in the heart of our
Speaker 3: city and around our city, why would you want to
Speaker 3: take that chance? And here's the reality. Yes, the reality
Speaker 3: is most of these victims and the suspects are involved
Speaker 3: in criminal activity. But the truth is that sometimes when
Speaker 3: it's happening at Fountain Square in places with innocent people
Speaker 3: can take a stray bullet. We've seen it happen innocent
Speaker 3: kids who are playing in parks, and we have these
Speaker 3: drive by shooting that happened all summer long. I mean,
Speaker 3: it is absolutely heartbreaking to me as somebody who loves
Speaker 3: this city and is so proud of the Queen City
Speaker 3: and I've said this before, Willie. Twenty three years ago
Speaker 3: when I came from Charlotte. I remember my police officer
Speaker 3: friends saying to me, why in the world would you
Speaker 3: want to live in Cincinnati. And we really created change here,
Speaker 3: and unfortunately it feels like we're going backwards. We have
Speaker 3: to be tough, and I think every parent who loses
Speaker 3: a child, even if their child is in their twenties
Speaker 3: and involved in crime, they too want to see changed.
Speaker 1: You know, one thing I've noticed, the convention Center is
Speaker 1: opening up. I think at the end of the year.
Speaker 1: I think December January. I might be wrong, but in
Speaker 1: the next few months, have you seen that the hotel
Speaker 1: come out of the ground. The answer is no, and
Speaker 1: the reason is Marriott is going to operate it. But
Speaker 1: the powers that be three c DC and others have
Speaker 1: to build it and it's not coming out of the
Speaker 1: ground because they cannot get financing. Now can you imagine
Speaker 1: that hotel should be coming out of the ground now,
Speaker 1: so when the convention center is open, the conventionaires can
Speaker 1: go into the hotel and guess what, have a great time.
Speaker 1: But at this point, as of a week ago, I
Speaker 1: was told by a rather prominent Cincinnatian that they cannot
Speaker 1: get financing, and they can't get financing because the banks
Speaker 1: don't want to do it, and so they want power
Speaker 1: brokers in town to guarantee the loan in case the
Speaker 1: events continue. By the way, the event on July twenty
Speaker 1: sixth happened right at the doorstep of the convention center.
Speaker 2: Uh. And and it's it's it's there's a story there as.
Speaker 1: To why is the hotel not coming out of the ground,
Speaker 1: And the answer is because they can't get financing. Why
Speaker 1: can't they get financing? Well, there's concern now if that
Speaker 1: happens and we have this great convention center and two
Speaker 1: of two big conventions have already canceled because the hotel
Speaker 1: is not available. That hotel is going to take what
Speaker 1: two years to build? And Uh, that's a problem.
Speaker 2: Is that a problem? That is a huge problem.
Speaker 1: And the problem there's a story find out why the
Speaker 1: convention center hotel is not being built. And right now
Speaker 1: it's a it's a dirt parking lot. And they wanted
Speaker 1: to start this thing a year ago when the convention
Speaker 1: center is being built. But the Chamber and others are
Speaker 1: trying to get financing. They can't get financing. Now that's
Speaker 1: a problem. So I don't know, Cherie. We've laid upon
Speaker 1: the table some necessary information is up to the powers
Speaker 1: that be to correct this thing and do something in
Speaker 1: the city. But right now the mayor's gone from this
Speaker 1: is wrong to this is unacceptable. Now it's intolerable. We're
Speaker 1: gone from wrong unacceptable now intolerable. What's the next five syllables?
Speaker 1: Get the the sarcees out and find out what the
Speaker 1: hell's next.
Speaker 3: Well, something has to be done, and you can't keep saying, okay,
Speaker 3: put more officers on the streets. Well again, I would
Speaker 3: argue that last night it appears as if you were
Speaker 3: officers right there. But when when people think the answer
Speaker 3: is pulling out a gun, I mean we see it
Speaker 3: time in and time out. That's the problem. If you're
Speaker 3: not afraid that if oh my god, I get caught
Speaker 3: shooting someone, I'm going to be locked up for.
Speaker 2: Years, not not happy.
Speaker 3: You're gonna take your chances. How it starts so young.
Speaker 3: We see teenagers, I mean twelve, thirteen, fourteen year old,
Speaker 3: and I always go back to what one since officer
Speaker 3: told me last year, He's like, sre your definition of
Speaker 3: a kid and My definition of the kids are very different,
Speaker 3: you know, getting trained.
Speaker 1: Young, young and because they know the juvenile court system
Speaker 1: here will not lock them up. Surrey up against the clock,
Speaker 1: you know, and that works. But try to find out
Speaker 1: what happened to the hotel, this beautiful hotel next to
Speaker 1: the convention center. That is that is that is nothing,
Speaker 1: and we got to run SCHERI get my best to
Speaker 1: all the folks.
Speaker 2: Calvert, now call her.
Speaker 1: Find out all right, thank you, thank you, Sari Pillow,
Speaker 1: thank you. Up against the clock. But River City we
Speaker 1: got a major problem. Seven hundred WW