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Cincinnati policeman indicted
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A GRAND jury indicted a white policeman on two minor charges for last month's shooting of an unarmed black man, a case that has sparked racially charged rioting.
The nine-member grand jury examining the April 7 shooting death of 19-year-old Timothy Thomas indicted the officer, Stephen Roach, for negligent homicide and obstructing official business, both misdemeanors, Hamilton County Prosecutor Mike Allen said.
Roach, 27, has been on unpaid leave since chasing Thomas down a dark alley, saying he opened fire when he believed Thomas was reaching for a gun. Thomas was the 15th black crime suspect to be killed by Cincinnati police since 1995, a period during which no white suspects were killed in the city.
Demonstrators charged police unfairly targeted blacks in this city of 300,000, which is 43 per cent black, and the protests evolved into rioting that resulted in dozens of injuries, hundreds of arrests and scores of looted and burned buildings.
Earlier on Monday, US Attorney General John Ashcroft announced a federal civil rights investigation of the Cincinnati Police Department and its tactics, with officials saying the timing was designed to defuse tensions in the city.
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