Report: Columbus anti-crime program viable despite pushback

COLUMBUS (AP) — An annual anti-crime program helps make Ohio’s capital safer despite criticism from protesters of two fatal shootings by officers, police said today in releasing statistics associated with the summer initiative.

The program deploys more officers during the warmer months in an effort to stem violence in the city’s most vulnerable neighborhoods.

But calls for changes to the so-called community safety initiative have mounted after the fatal police shootings of 23-year-old Henry Green and 13-year-old Tyre King.

Tyre was shot Sept. 14 after he ran from an officer investigating a reported armed robbery and pulled a BB gun that looked like a real firearm, police say.

Green was shot June 6 after he ignored the commands of two plainclothes officers to drop his gun and fired on them, police say. His death came during the summer initiative.