CINCINNATI — Neighbors on Clark Street in the West End said dozens of shots were fired early Saturday morning, resulting in damage to cars and nearby buildings.
Steve Goodin, a former Cincinnati city council member, shared photos with us of the damage left behind.
"They say anywhere from 65 to 70 shots is what they counted," Goodin said.
He said he wasn't sure whether the incident would be considered a violent crime in the city, because no one was injured. Violent crime is something that Mayor Aftab Pureval and Police Chief Teresa Theetge have said is down.
A city spokesperson confirmed with us that Saturday's shooting was recorded as a felonious assault in their data.
Learn more about how police report violent crime in the video below:
In light of recent violence in Cincinnati, we've seen your concerns about how crime data is reported.
"It seems like it should be simple, but it's often not," said Cory Haberman, the director of the University of Cincinnati's Institute of Crime Science.
We spoke to Haberman on Tuesday to try to learn more about how police report crime data, specifically violent crime.
"Typically, under the Uniform Crime Report, (the way) we define violent crime would be: homicide, aggravated assault, robbery and rape."
Haberman said it can take time to classify certain cases and he said police have certain rules to follow when designating crime types.
"There's a lot of discretion involved in any of these situations; the officer has to go out to the scene, determine what happened, try to get all sides and figure out the facts of the case," Haberman said.
He said he understands there are some concerns from people about the data they see. So, we asked him what advice he has for people who want to learn more about that information:
"There's a role for the community to step in and say 'hey, we're interested in these numbers, you've produced, say, your part one crime numbers, but we're looking for something a little bit more specific,'" Haberman said.
If you'd like to look into some of the crime data yourself, you can find it here at Cincy Insights.
