Cincinnati Councilman John Cranley expected to see a big crowd at the April 9 City Council meeting, maybe 40 or 50 people.

        Just two days earlier, an unarmed black man named Timothy Thomas had been shot and killed by a police officer.

        The 19-year-old man was the 15th African-American killed by police since 1995. Blacks in Cincinnati were upset. More and more, meetings at City Hall were where they vented their anger.

        The meetings had almost become routine. Protesters demanded action, politicians promised to study the issue and then everything went back to normal, back to the status quo.

        Many people said that's just the way things worked in Cincinnati, where the topic of race has been shrouded for years in a polite silence.

        Few at City Hall thought April 9 would be different.

        Then Mr. Cranley opened the doors to council chambers and walked inside.

Apr. 9, 2001 - An angry crowd jammed City Concil Chambers in response to the police shooting of Timothy Thomas. Enquirer photo by Glen Hartong | ZOOM |

        He saw several hundred people packed into the room. One carried a "COP KILLERS" sign. Another led a chant of "No justice, no peace!" Mr. Thomas' mother, Angela Leisure, sat in the middle of the crowd, surrounded by young men with arms folded across their chests.

        As chairman of council's Law Committee, it was Mr. Cranley's job to oversee the meeting. He knew right away it would be anything but routine.

        "We'd run the meeting that way for so long, we never considered this could happen," Mr. Cranley said a few days later. "We didn't know it would be like this."

        He wasn't the only one in Cincinnati shocked by the outburst. The city and the nation had made significant progress on racial issues since the 1960s, from affirmative action to civil rights.

        Many people couldn't understand why there was so much rage.

        But tempers flared quickly in Over-the-Rhine, the neighborhood where Mr. Thomas was shot to death by Officer Stephen Roach.

        The Rev. Damon Lynch III sensed the anger from his pulpit at New Prospect Baptist Church, a few blocks from where Mr. Thomas died.

        The members of his congregation weren't interested in seeing Cincinnati get back to normal after the shooting. They wanted serious, lasting change. They wanted to shake things up.

        "If you're fine when things are normal, then you want things to stay normal,'' the Rev. Mr. Lynch says now. "If you're not, then normal is an uncomfortable place to be."

Apr. 10, 2001 - Protestors gather at the scene of the fatal police shooting of Timothy Thomas where a memorial has been placed in the alleyway near Republic Street. (Enquirer photo by Steven M Herppich) | ZOOM |

        Many African-Americans expressed their discomfort by making a pilgrimage to the alley where Mr. Thomas died. They left flowers and candles and personal notes. Someone spray-painted a bright red "R.I.P." on a nearby wall.

        "The cops better watch out," said one man in the alley.

        The outpouring of grief was more intense than it had been for any of the other men killed by police. In part, that was because Mr. Thomas was different from most of the others.

        He did not have a serious criminal record, and he wasn't carrying a gun. He was shot after running from police, trying to avoid an arrest for old traffic violations.

        Officer Roach would explain later that he thought Mr. Thomas had reached for a gun in his baggy pants. He said he feared for his life. When the two men confronted each other in the dark alley, his gun "just went off," the officer said.

        The explanations did little to ease tension in the community. Instead of returning to normal, the city seemed to be getting angrier. Jeff Harris, a firefighter in Over-the-Rhine, felt the tension while responding to emergency calls.

        On minor runs, firefighters and police often chatted and joked around with folks in the neighborhood. But not on the weekend of the shooting.

        "When the police showed up, there was silence," Mr. Harris recalls. "The police wouldn't talk. The people wouldn't talk. You could feel it.

        "You could see it coming."

        No one could predict exactly what was coming. But at his committee meeting on April 9, John Cranley began to worry about what the future might bring.

        The more he banged the gavel, the more disruptive the crowd became. He abandoned all hope of having a normal meeting when the protesters took over the microphone.

        "We want answers!" one of them shouted.

        But most of the answers offered by council members were shouted down, dismissed as inadequate. The old way of doing business was not going to calm this crowd.

        After three hours, the protesters headed for the doors, still chanting and shouting.

        No one was sure what they would do next.

Cincinnati 2001: Year of Unrest
Prologue to turmoil: "A very tense time"
The trigger: Shooting 'ignites furious response'
The riots explode: A city's dark week
Summer of blood - guns rule the streets
Tests of justice: Officers acquitted
Binding wounds: What can be done?
What comes next?: Good examples few
WARD BUSHEE: A chance to talk honestly ... and to act
2001: A timeline
Unrest photo timeline
Jim Borgman on race