On many counts, the police manhunt for Dioro Geroski in the summer of 1995 was a failed one.
Three men were wrongly identified by police as Mr. Geroski. Two of them were pulled from a car at gunpoint. The other ran from police and, according to two witnesses, was beaten by officers.
All three men claimed police used excessive force.
And Mr. Geroski, wanted for allegedly assaulting two police officers, wasn't caught until later that year.
While cases of mistaken identity occur frequently in police work, how the Cincinnati police handled those and some other recent cases illustrates the peril of being mistaken for a suspect wanted by police.
The cases also raise questions about the internal investigations into the arrests and point out some shortfalls in how police deal with people they have mistakenly stopped or arrested.
Among them: When mistakes are made, why don't police simply apologize?
There were no apologies to the three men whose paths collided with police in July 1995 during the hunt for Dioro Geroski. Eager to catch their man, police ended up scarring the men's lives.
The first was Goldie Evans, a 16-year-old Mount Auburn youth who was walking home from downtown the night of July when a police car pulled up.
An officer asked him his name. At first he said "Goldie." Asked again, he responded "Goldie Evans."
"I told them three times. Then, one of them jumps out of the car."
Fearful, the youth began to run. Police gave chase, believing the teen was not Goldie Evans but Dioro Geroski.
After running through Over-the-Rhine for about five minutes, Mr. Evans grew tired. Exhausted and standing near a pile of wood in an alley near Findlay Market, he took off his shirt and hoped police wouldn't find him in the dark.
But two female officers quickly located him and, and according to him, approached with guns drawn. He emerged from the woodpile and lay face down on the ground as they handcuffed him, he said, and other officers arrived.
"That's when the trouble started," Mr. Evans said. "They started putting feet in my face. There was broken old wood and nails in my face. They were stomping me. And then they come up and Maced me, too. I'm bleeding already, and they Maced me. I thought I was going to die."
In the beating that he alleges ensued, he suffered cuts on his face, a minor concussion and knots on the back of his head. At no time, he said, did police ask him for ID which he had with him.
It was not until later that evening police realized their error and the man they had chased and arrested was not Dioro Geroski. Even so, they arrested Mr. Evans for resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.
"I didn't put up no fight," he said. "I was tired from running."
Mr. Evans was beaten so much, said his mother, Evelyn Evans, "he couldn't even walk." Officers wouldn't take him to the hospital, she said, until the juvenile detention center refused to admit him.
"Nobody wanna apologize, nobody wanna do nothing," his mother said.
Instead, an internal police investigation cleared the officers of any wrongdoing, despite accounts from two witnesses that mirrored Mr. Evans' story.
Marquisa Harmon said she saw "police hitting him with their guns and sticks in the face." He was beaten so much "that he couldn't even walk."
Donna Rachel told investigators Mr. Evans was "lying on the ground with his hand behind his back while the officers were standing" on his head and striking him with guns and nightsticks.
Though internal investigators exonerated the officers involved - Pat Galligan, Finnis Bonner, Stacie Glenn, Jennifer Ernst, Orlando Smith, Jason Drach and Scott McManis - other questions were left unanswered. Among them: Officer Drach said he saw another officer throw a punch, though he could not identify which one.
All of the other officers told investigators they did not throw or witness any punches.
Mr. Evans told The Enquirer he was upset by one other detail lost in the investigation.
"I know Dioro," he said. "I don't look anything like Dioro."
That also appears to be true of Thomas Edward Price, who was mistaken for Dioro Geroski during the manhunt. While a passenger in a green BMW driven by Damon Noble, 26, of Northside, Mr. Price reportedly was spotted by police.
They followed the car through Clifton and Corryville for nearly a half-hour before pulling it over at a roadblock on University Avenue. Nine police officers, with guns drawn, approached the car.
"I didn't know what to do," Mr. Noble said. "Everyone was yelling at me and pointing a gun at me. I thought they were going to shoot me."
With all of those guns pointed at them, Mr. Noble thought at the time, "My partner must have committed robbery, because I knew I hadn't done anything wrong."
Police pulled Mr. Price from the car first, then Mr. Noble. "They slammed (Mr. Price) to the ground, and put a knee on his head," Mr. Noble said. "He ended up with a scrape under his eye."
"They put a gun to my head and hit me with the gun on the side of my head. Later, they claimed nobody hit me."
As officers prepared to leave, Mr. Noble demanded an apology. But one officer told him "We feel we don't owe you an apology."
The two men immediately went to a nearby police station in Bond Hill to report what happened and police there "acted real interested," Mr. Noble said.
"They were like, 'Let's go get the bad guys.' Then they figured out we were talking about police."
An ensuing internal investigation exonerated the officers and concluded the men were not struck with guns.
Since that day, Mr. Noble has suffered anxiety attacks and has trouble sleeping. He goes to group therapy to deal with it.
Mr. Noble also said police erred in another way: Mr. Price is light-skinned; Dioro Geroski is dark-skinned. "They don't look anything alike."
For the record, police finally caught their man, Dioro Geroski, in October 1995. He was later convicted of assault, but is appealing.
Today's coverage
Force often used in custody GIF (133K)
Process for investigating use of force STORY
Police: Tough job, many critics STORY
Mistaken identities but no apologies STORY
Case stories STORY
Monday
City's watchdog barks but doesn't bite.
Tuesday
Experts suggest
solutions.
Making of the series
1,400 cases reviewed STORY
Police response STORY
