The man investigators say can place embattled Cincinnati Police Lt. Col. Ron Twitty in a park well after 1 a.m. July 4 said Thursday he's frustrated with the attention he's getting and isn't sure how good a witness he'll be.

        William Spillers, former publisher of the Cincinnati Herald, said he has been taking some flak since word got out that he's the one who told police he saw the assistant chief in McEvoy Park in College Hill about 2 a.m.

Spillers

        That conflicts with Lt. Col. Twitty's claim that he was home in bed in Bond Hill by 1 a.m. the night his city owned car received several thousand dollars in damage.

        “I am through with this,” Mr. Spillers said. “It's over with me.”

        Col. Twitty, the only African-American ever to rise to the rank of assistant chief in Cincinnati, was put on administrative leave with pay July 12 after Chief Tom Streicher questioned his explanation that his Ford Taurus must have been damaged by a hit-skip driver July 4 on the street in front of his house while he slept.

        His attorney, former federal Prosecutor Sharon Zealey, has continued to insist that her client has been the victim of a smear campaign over the past few weeks. She did not return phone calls Thursday.

        Mr. Spillers, who ran unsuccessfully for Cincinnati School Board in 1995 and sold the newspaper in 1996, now works at Shakers Entertainment, a College Hill bar just down the street from the hair salon operated by Col. Twitty's wife.

        At the bar Thursday afternoon, Mr. Spillers said his involvement in the case “is a nonstory — trust me.”

        “I'm not sure I'll be a very good witness,” he said. “I'm just not sure.”

        He would not answer any questions about that night, including whom Col. Twitty was with and whether he noticed any damage to the gray Taurus. He also would not say who was giving him grief over telling police what he saw.

        Mr. Spillers apparently was in the park reserving the shelter area for a holiday party — that's where Tony Penny, who lives nearby in College Hill, saw him about 5:30 a.m. Mr. Penny's son called police because the park was supposed to be closed until 6 a.m., and the Pennys had hoped to be the first ones there to get the shelter for the day.

        A Cincinnati police officer, Jeanette Whitfield, responded to the scene, but told Mr. Penny that it was too late — that Mr. Spillers had already secured the park for the day.

        Mr. Penny said he had no idea until he saw stories about Col. Twitty in the news why the police had been calling him to ask what he saw that night. He didn't return any of the officers' calls.

        “I never put two and two together,” he said Thursday. “All I knew is I got beat out of the park.”

        Mr. Penny said it was too dark to see very well that morning — and that he wouldn't know Col. Twitty even if he had seen him.

        A source close to the investigation has said Col. Twitty was in the park at 5 a.m. with between two and five people after leaving Fricker's, a North College Hill restaurant and bar where he spent some time with friends.

        Records of calls on Col. Twitty's city cell phone show it was not used between the key hours of 1 and 5 a.m.

        He placed a call July 4 at 12:39 a.m. and again at 7:34 a.m., when Col. Twitty said he went to play golf after reporting the hit-skip.

        Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen has requested a special grand jury to hear the case, but has not convened it yet.

        Col. Twitty has not been charged with anything.

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