AVONDALE
On a typical school
day, children spill from a Rockdale Avenue school and race past a statue of
Abraham Lincoln, a gift to the city in 1902.
Lorraine Holley
hoists her stop sign and defiantly walks into the intersection of Reading Road
and Rockdale, constantly turning her head left to right as she ushers the South
Avondale Elementary students across the street.
She can make sure
they cross safely, but Holley worries they may eventually become homicide or
gunshot victims like so many others here.
Anti-violence
advocates across the city say it's time to put down the guns. They say it's
time to come to grips with the realities facing young African-Americans - many
are dying before their parents.
Since 2002, police
statistics show, the three most violent city blocks in Cincinnati are in
Avondale, one of them this stretch of Reading, followed by a nearby block of
Burnet Avenue. A second stretch of Reading, also close by, comes in a close
third.
"Baby, I ain't
got a number for you," Holley said when asked how often she's heard
gunfire.
When it's happened
before, she said, she grabbed as many kids as she could and got them to huddle
together much like a quarterback would do when planning his next offensive
move.
But this isn't
football.
This is life in the
3500 block of Reading Road in Avondale.
"It's
treacherous out there," said Jennifer Williams, director of the
anti-violence program Out of the Crossfire.
The city appeared on
track early in 2008 to further reduce its homicide numbers from 2007, a rate
that had peaked with a modern-day record of 89 homicides in 2006.
It didn't happen.
During the fall, the
city's rate jumped ahead of the 68 homicides in 2007 and Cincinnati ended 2008
with 75.
Despite the dip from
2006, shootings are still epidemic. For every homicide, between eight and 10
people are shot in the city.
During Christmas
week, more than six people were shot in the city, said Dr. Jay Johannigman, a
trauma surgeon at University Hospital.
A couple from West
Chester or Montgomery celebrating an anniversary in downtown Cincinnati has
little to worry about when it comes to their safety, but residents living in
some of the city's worst combat zones have a lot to worry about.
They are tired of the
violence and many look forward to the day they don't run out of hands and toes
when they tally the people they know who have been shot.
The three most
dangerous areas are all in Avondale, the city's largest African-American
neighborhood.
Fifty-one homicides,
shootings or aggravated assaults have been reported since the beginning of 2002
in the 3500 block of Reading, which begins at the Lincoln statue at Rockdale,
police records show.
Not far from there,
in the 3500 block of Burnet Avenue, 50 homicides, shootings or aggravated
assaults were reported during the same period. A bit north, just up the road in
the 3700 block of Reading, 40 such crimes were reported in the past six years.
The three tough city
blocks are home to two elementary schools, South Avondale Elementary, where
Holley scoots the children across the multiple lanes of traffic each morning
and afternoon, and Rockdale Elementary on Burnet Avenue.
The dangerous turf is
also near nationally renowned hospitals, University and Children's Hospital
Medical Center. Burnet Avenue also offers a home away from home - the Ronald
McDonald House - for families whose children must be hospitalized for long
periods.
Residents tell
stories of ducking from gunfire that has killed people at bus stops or people
sitting on couches in their homes. Children coming out of stores have also been
caught in the crossfire.
'We are dying out
here'
"We are dying
out here for nothing," says Mitch Morris, 53 who lives in Avondale.
"You don't have to go to Iraq for that. We have a war right here in the
city. ... We are at war right now."
The blocks are
festooned with reminders of the dead.
Stuffed teddy bears
cover a utility pole outside the Crescent, a sprawling low-income high rise in
the 3700 block of Reading.
For now, the pole
memorializes Travis Williams.
Written in black
marker on the pole are the words, "RIP with God." A Bible is tacked
to the old wooden pole, as is an 8-by-10 photograph of Williams and friends.
At 11:30 p.m. on
Sept. 25, Williams became the city's 52nd homicide victim of 2008.
Earlier that night,
Williams told friends at the Crescent it was time to take a break from the
streets. He said he was heading to his mother's house in Mount Auburn to chill
out for a few weeks.
Twenty-three homicide
victims later, the year finally ended. Victims ranged in age from 11 weeks to
83 years.
Gunfire is the
confirmed cause in the deaths of 61 of the 75. Fifty-seven of the homicide
victims were African-Americans, like Williams.
"We cannot
continue with this type of slaughter," said Abdul Bilal, a member of the
Cincinnati Streetworker Program, which offers outreach at the Avondale Pride
Center.
The center is next to
one of the mean streets, the 3500 block of Burnet. "It's getting old and
the people are getting tired," he said of the violence.
Williams rolled up a
long criminal record with a heavy dose of violence before he died in September.
He was accused of knocking the teeth out of someone he pummeled. At 18, he also
was accused of pulling a knife and threatening to stab a man if the man didn't
buy drugs.
He lived and died in
front of the Crescent. The group he ran with calls itself the Crack Side.
"It's not a gang;
It's a family," said David Horsley, 21, a Crack Side member and Williams'
close friend.
Crescent resident
Rhonda Beatty said people in the neighborhood were afraid of Williams.
Beatty said she walks
past the Williams effigy daily without giving it much thought. "That's
what happens when you sell drugs," she said. "... Nothing good is
going to come of you if you sell drugs."
Bernard Irvin, a
Woodward High School senior, saw the good in Williams. Williams, he said,
praised him for going to school, playing sports and for not running the streets
like he did.
Williams even grabbed
a gun out of Horsley's hands when Horsley intended to shoot someone.
"He said it
wasn't worth it," Horsley said.
Caught up in 'wrong
things'
"He was good at
heart. He was just caught up in the wrong things," Irvin said.
Those wrong things
gave Williams the very strong feeling that he would die - soon.
"He wasn't
afraid; he always knew he'd die," Irvin said.
The notion and
expectation of death is very real for many in the inner city.
Twenty-year-old
Nathaniel Sanders knew people were gunning for him.
When police found him
dying of a gunshot wound in a West End alley on Sept. 26, he was wearing a
bullet-resistant vest.
No one has been
arrested for his death, although many say his death was meant to even a score.
Sanders had a
reputation as a tough kid in the city's West End, said City Councilman Cecil
Thomas, who warned police to look out for him and tried to persuade his parents
to get to him before street justice did.
"This kid had instilled
so much fear," Thomas said. "The only justice was going to be street
justice and it was obvious that it was coming."
Police found Sanders
cradled in the fetal position with his hands wrapped around his head. He had
been shot in the stomach and the head.
Even youths who play
it straight, like Irvin, don't think they are invincible. "I know death is
going to happen because I live in the hood like everyone else," he said.
It's hard to find
someone - anyone over 15 - who lives in Avondale who doesn't know someone
affected by gun violence.
Monique Ingram, 16,
can list six people she knows who have been shot. The teen grew up in Avondale,
but now lives in St. Bernard. Two of those shot died.
Some victims are
missed more than others.
These days it has
been lonely in the 3700 block for Tyron Williams, who said he hung with Travis
Williams.
Tyron stops by the
teddy bear and Bible-covered utility pole that serves as Travis Williams'
memorial each day.
"Is it good up
there?" Tyron will ask staring up at the pole. "You all right? Me,
I'm just trying to live."
Many don't.
A brick wall inside
one entrance at The Crescent is testimony to the violence in Avondale. Scrawled
across the old red brick wall in black ink are the names of those who died.
"Man I Miss My
Dawgz RIP Eugene, Marcus, Ed, Lil Steven Chris B, G-Money, Lil' Matt, $lick NiA
centsk, Black Kev, Head, Lil' Kevin, Lil' Dav, MacMal."
"People (around
here) just adapt to it," said Irvin as he stood in front of the wall.
Not long after
Williams was gunned down with a bullet to the chest, his friend, Maurice
Weaver, 21, was arrested for his murder. Weaver, also a Crack Side member,
boasted to other members that when he turned 21, he was going to kill someone.
He made good on the
promise five days after his 21st birthday.
Street codes fall by
wayside
Neither man observed
the old code of the streets.
Cincinnati Streetworkers - many of whom once lived the life of
drugs deals and robberies - speak out about the dangerous life that saturates
blocks like 3500 Reading,
3500 Burnet and 3700 Reading.
"None of these
guys are adhering to the (old) street code," said Bilal. "Hustling
back in the day was never meant to be a full-time job; it was something you did
part time. These guys are now in it full swing. The street code was in place to
keep people from getting killed."
The code said don't
bring gangs into your neighborhood.
The code said family
first, not your friends on the street.
The code meant taking
Sunday off.
This year, nine
people died on Sundays.
The code meant keeping
teens out of the game. Ten teens died last year.
"I'm sick of the
streets," Bilal said. "I'm sick of the teddy bears on the street
poles. I'm sick of mothers outliving their sons."
Children's Hospital
Medical Center has seen more than 243 gunshot victims since 2000.
University Hospital
saw 67 gunshot victims in 2000. None were victims of accidental shootings or
self-inflicted wounds. As of Dec. 15, the hospital treated 372 shooting victims
in 2008.
"It's like (the
street code is) ancient rules now," Bilal said. "The code was to keep
all the negative stuff out of the communities."
That negative stuff
is nowhere more apparent than along the 3500 block of Burnet.
A disrespectful
comment or gesture at worst would end in a fist fight back in Rev. Peterson Mingo's
day when he ran with the Lucky 13 gang in Avondale in the 1960s. Today, it
tends to end in a gun battle.
The corner parking
lot of a convenience store is ripe pickings for people looking to peddle dope
or to even a score.
For now, at least, it
is the narrative and the norm of the street, says Robin Engel, a University of
Cincinnati professor who has teamed up with the Cincinnati Police Department
for the anti-violence program, the Cincinnati Initiative to Reduce Violence.
"Right now, the
code of the street is if someone disrespects you, you have to resort to
violence," she says.
Dead, young men in
20s
Of the 75 homicide
victims in 2008, 28 were between the age of 20 and 29.
The way Tony Calhoun,
33, sees it that can also be pretty fatalistic for young black men.
Calhoun, who is
unemployed most of the time and has a criminal record, said the lack of jobs
gives young men and those his age little hope.
With nothing to do,
they congregate, many times in the 3500 block of Burnet.
He and friend
Benjamin Smith, 27, were there one evening last month.
"Stand here long
enough and you'll see some action," Smith said.
Both say they know
dozens of people who have been shot, many right on that corner.
"It's an
everyday thing," Calhoun said. "You get used to it."
As the two spoke,
darkness fell over the area. Instead of the crowd thinning for dinnertime, it
swelled.
"The majority of
the problems here is that there is nothing to do," Calhoun said. He
admitted he was bored and walked down to the end of Burnet to check in with
others in the neighborhood.
"Put everyone in
one spot and that just gives you more reasons to mess with folks. That's why
stuff happens the way it does.
"People are
getting shot because they have nothing to do. They have no outlet. No place to
chill out and relax or a place to have something constructive to do."
That's why many join
gangs.
Police have
identified 48 different groups that they describe as violent.
An analysis of 83
homicides between June 2006 and June 2007 suggested that in 72 percent, the
victim or the offender was a member of a street group.
Calhoun was in a gang
from the age of 16 to 21. The gang fell apart with the beating death of someone
in the West End.
That was enough for
Calhoun.
"They stomped
him in the face until his face cracked," he said.
Irvin, the Woodward
senior, hopes to leave this all behind this fall. He's thinking about colleges
in Denver, Connecticut and Texas. "I'm trying to get as far away from here
as I can.
"Hopefully these
guys out here will let me live long enough. My fear is that these guys will
stop me before I get a chance to make a change."
Three Avondale blocks
top list of most violent
Rife with gunfire,
three Avondale blocks top Cincinnati's deadliest streets. These blocks are home
to two schools and are near world-class hospitals.
Where the crime is
most concentrated
Three city blocks,
all in Avondale, are the deadliest in the city. At The Enquirer's request,
Cincinnati police tracked homicides, shootings and aggravated assaults over the
past six years. The three blocks had a total of 141 such crimes. The central
part of the city (right) has the highest concentration. The darker the circle,
the more dangerous the area. The map lists all 125 street blocks that have had
at least 10 acts of such violence in the past six years. The No. 1 deadliest
spot is the 3500 block of Reading Road, with 51 such acts of violence.
the establishment - protecting Black-Run America (BRA) - don't want you to know.
