CINCINNATI —

A 17-year-old boy has been charged in the death of a his 8-week-old son in East Price Hill, Cincinnati police said.

According to police, on Sept. 17 just before 11 p.m. District Three officers responded to the 700 block of Elberon Avenue for a report of an unresponsive infant.

The infant was transported to Cincinnati Children's Medical Center by the Cincinnati Fire Department, police said.

Officials said the infant boy died at 8 weeks of age on Oct. 27 at Cincinnati Children's Medical Center. He has been identified as Ukhani Bridges.

Cincinnati police arrested a 17-year-old boy was arrested the same day, police said. He has been charged with murder for the death of the infant. Cincinnati police said the infant was the teenager's son.

The teen is currently being held at the Hamilton County Juvenile Court Youth Center.

The teen appeared in juvenile court Friday. His next court date is on Nov. 9 at 9 a.m.

WLWT will not be releasing the name of the suspect at this time, due to their age.

The investigation by the Cincinnati Police Department's Homicide Unit is ongoing.

Anyone with information about this homicide is asked to call the Homicide Unit at (513) 352-3542.

CINCINNATI — A Columbus homebuilder who grew up in East Price Hill is hoping to turn Sedamsville into Cincinnati’s next new housing hot spot, with 40 luxury river view homes on vacant land he acquired in November.

Kim Knoppe, founder of Autumnwood Homes, purchased 26 River Road parcels from Ray Brown, an apartment investor who assembled a development site more than a decade ago but never completed his vision for a mid-rise condominium project on River Road west of the Waldvogel Viaduct.

“The views are magnificent and that’s what attracted me to this property,” Knoppe said. “And I’m not talking about a much better place for the West Side residents. I’m talking about attracting the East Side residents and North Side residents and let them know the hidden gems that are here on the West Side.”

The Sedamsville project is the latest in a series of moves through which Knoppe plans to reinvest the wealth he amassed over decades in Columbus into the communities that shaped his character.

“Everything I have, and I mean everything, including the house I live in and all its furnishings, are in a trust,” he said. “And the beneficiary of that trust is the Kim Knoppe Foundation. So, everything I do, I’m doing for charity in the long run.”

Realtor Don Johnson sees Knoppe as a visionary who has the financial resources and patience to bring lasting improvements to the West Side, much like the Cincinnati Center City Development Corp. did for Over-the-Rhine.

“OTR has 3CDC. Price Hill and Sedamsville has Kim Knoppe,” said Johnson, a regional vice president for Cutler Real Estate.

Johnson worked with Knoppe to acquire dozens of vacant lots in the Incline District of East Price Hill, where Knoppe designed a three-story home that will be the model for his Sedamsville development. Now under construction on Hawthorne Avenue, the three-bedroom home has 2.5 baths, a two-car garage and a list price of $450,000. Knoppe expects to sell the same model for up to $700,000 in Sedamsville.

Provided by Kim Knoppe

“With the rise in property value in the Incline District, we have now reached the next progression,” Johnson said. “With 15-year tax abatements, this makes for a more affordable option even at a higher purchase price.”

Knoppe is working to schedule a meeting with the Sedamsville Civic Association, but Vice President Cindy Bastin is cautiously optimistic about what she’s heard about Knoppe so far.

Scott Wegener

“I think it sounds exciting,” Bastin said. “We’re the type of neighborhood that really needs some new development.”

Built by German immigrants in the 1800s, Sedamsville is well known to baseball fans as the birthplace of Pete Rose. But the neighborhood has been threatened over time by floods, highway improvements and bad developers.

“Sedamsville is only five streets,” Bastin said. “We’re the second-smallest community in Cincinnati. We don’t have any business district at all. We have a Speedway and a Shell gas station. That’s nothing.”

The widening of U.S. 50 in the 1940s destroyed its business district. The 1976 closure of Our Lady of Perpetual Help school and 1989 closure of its red-brick Gothic church robbed the neighborhood of its cultural anchors. And St. Mark’s German Evangelical Church was demolished by Ray Brown in 2008, nine days before neighbors got the building listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Provided by Kim Knoppe

That demolition made Brown unpopular in Sedamsville, but Bastin said another big property owner did even more damage to the neighborhood by sexually harassing tenants and failing to follow the terms of a federal consent decree he signed in 2020.

“John Klosterman was probably the worst property owner we’ve ever had,” Bastin said. “He owns like 70-80 pieces of property and to just have it sit there and deteriorate was sad. (But) if we can get developers in who really want to clean up the neighborhood and redevelop some of the older houses, then I’m all for it.”

Whether Knoppe can meet those expectations remains to be seen. But he is clearly taking a different approach than the developers who preceded him in Sedamsville.

Provided by Kim Knoppe

The 71-year-old real estate investor was born on Grand Avenue and set a record in 1968 with 44 receptions for Elder High School’s football team. He returned to a hero’s welcome in 2018 when he pledged $1 million to complete the second floor of the Panther Fitness Center.

Knoppe made the donation to honor Mike Honold, whose “playbook defined the Elder experience and instilled a confidence that cannot be described,” Knoppe wrote for a plaque honoring his former coach.

After graduating from Xavier University and relocating to Columbus, Knoppe became one of central Ohio’s most prolific property flippers – buying and renovating thousands of single-family homes and selling them in lease-to-own transactions through Autumnwood Homes, founded in 1987. As the company grew, Knoppe started financing real estate transactions for other investors all over Ohio. In 2013, the head of the Columbus Real Estate Investors Association called Knoppe “the single-biggest expert in rehabbing houses in the state of Ohio."

But Knoppe wasn’t an active investor in his hometown until 2018, when he bought a condo at Queens Tower and started exploring the neighborhoods he roamed as a kid. In the three years following that purchase, Knoppe has been consolidating his companies into a family trust that will continue to operate his companies after he dies while paying a percentage of its profits to the Kim Knoppe Foundation.

“I see Price Hill, especially East Price Hill and Sedamsville as an area where I personally can make an impact,” Knoppe said. “I would like to go out doing something good.”

EAST PRICE HILL — Cincinnati Police identified the woman killed overnight in what authorities described as an "out of control" Halloween party in East Price Hill.

Officers responded to the report of a shooting in the 800 block of Elberon Avenue in the Incline District. Kellie Drollinger, 34, was taken to University of Cincinnati Medical Center where she later died from a gunshot wound.

A woman who lives near the area said she heard the gunshots and got her son out of bed and onto the ground. She said she counted at least 60 "kids" running out of an apartment complex and heard a car speed off.

Police said one other person was injured in the shooting. No information has been released on suspects or arrests.

Investigators with the Cincinnati Police Department's Homicide Unit urge anyone with any information to call 513-352-3542.

CINCINNATI — A 17-year-old has been arrested in connection to a fatal shooting in East Price Hill Saturday morning.

Cincinnati Police responded to a report of a shooting in the 400 block of Purcell Avenue at around 11 a.m. Saturday. Officers found 18-year-old Auve'yonce French, who officials later determined was deceased. A 17-year-old male was arrested and charged with reckless homicide.

Provided by family of Auve'yonce French

The Homicide Unit is investigating, and police ask anyone with information to call (513) 352-3542.

Cincinnati Police Chief Eliot Isaac said Friday more juveniles have been arrested for homicides this year than at any other time in his more than 30-year career. Isaac pointed to easy access to high-powered guns.

"We're not talking about some cheap old gun that belonged to Grandpa. We're talking about Glocks, AR-15s, we're talking abut sophisticated weapons," Isaac said. "We've taken over 1,300 guns off the street so far this year, more than any other year before, and yet we're still seeing what's occurring."

Isaac will retire in early 2022, but said he is working with juvenile judges and the superintendent of Cincinnati Public Schools to address problems specific to juvenile crimes.