Cincinnati police chief blames district for rise in incidents between students and police

Cincinnati Police Chief Teresa Theetge made an unscheduled appearance at the Cincinnati Public Schools Board of Education meeting on Monday to urge district leaders to address the increasing number of incidents involving students and police at city transportation centers.

During the public comment portion of Monday's meeting, Theetge gave a presentation to the board outlining her department's problems with CPS students specifically. The chief told the board that while juvenile crime has declined citywide, incidents between students and police at four city transit centers — Government Square, Oakley Station, Northside Transit Center and Glenway Crossing — have increased sharply since the start of the school year.

Theetge says there were more criminal incidents involving juveniles in the first nine months of 2024 at these four transit centers than in all of 2023. So far this year, 74 incidents have been reported, compared to 62 reported incidents last year. Theetge claims many of them involve CPS students.

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The chief told the panel that these incidents often involve ten or more students and that this has put students and police officers in increasingly dangerous situations. She added that the problem has spread to CPS grounds, citing shootings near Taft High School and Hughes High School in the past 30 days. Theetge then warned the panel that the situation could escalate if CPS does not come up with solutions soon.

“I'll tell you how it's going to end,” she said. “We're going to have a critical incident, at a transit center, at a school, at a football game or anywhere, where one of our highly trained, highly educated Cincinnati police officers encounters a 12-, 13-, 14-, 15-year-old CPS student with a firearm, and most likely it's going to end with an officer having to decide whether to shoot them or whether to shoot them.”

Theetge also criticized the school district and school board for not doing enough to address student violence across the city. She told school board members that the presence of CPD officers in transit centers and school police officers in school buildings is sometimes criticized for contributing to the school-to-prison pipeline, but said she blames school board policies for allowing the problem to persist.

“I would disagree with you that the policies of this board are fueling this phenomenon, because we as police are now forced to deal with your students in these transit centers, and when we witness criminal activity, most of the time we have no choice but to make an arrest,” she said.

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While Theetge did not specify what actions made the situation worse, she did mention that community leader Iris Roley and several volunteers were at Government Square to act as a buffer between the youth and police. She encouraged the school district to launch a similar effort.

“Be out there with us. See what we're seeing. See what our officers are dealing with,” Theetge said. “Give us some of your resources to support our resources.”

The police chief then attempted to allow other police officers to speak, but her request was immediately rejected by board chair Eve Bolton.

“I appreciate your words, but we do not have enough time for the rest of your entourage to provide us with further information,” Bolton said.

Bolton claims she was not informed prior to the meeting that Chief Theetge planned to make the presentation, and that the board does not typically respond directly to comments during a public hearing. Bolton said board members will discuss the issue further with city leaders at a later date.