This Week in Cincinnati Crime: July 19–25

Two Winton Hills Shootings in Six Days

A weekly summary of the region’s major crime news, plus what’s changed on cases from prior weeks. This is the first edition.

This week’s Cincinnati crime coverage starts with a Winton Hills shooting, where a homicide and a juvenile shooting occurred six days apart. The region’s most extreme case unfolded somewhere less commonly associated with gun violence: inside a Mason workplace. Court records say a former employee shot Vincent Stoetzel approximately 22 times. Warren County Prosecutor David Fornshell said the fatal shootings he has encountered during 15 years in office typically involved three to six rounds, not 22.

Homicides and Cincinnati Shootings

Case #26-0719-01 — Winton Hills, Dutch Colony Drive, July 19
Someone shot Montez Yett, 37, just before 3:40 a.m. Sunday in the 800 block of Dutch Colony Drive. Fire crews attempted life-saving measures, but he died at the scene. Police haven’t released suspect information. This is the first of two shootings in Winton Hills this week. Local 12 reported the killing.

Case #26-0722-01 — Mason, Carter Lumber on Reading Road, July 22
A former employee shot Vincent Stoetzel, 29, approximately 22 times inside Carter Lumber’s door-manufacturing warehouse around 1:15 p.m. Wednesday. Stoetzel worked at the company and had four children. David Cohen, 34, of Hamilton, fled the scene. Officers arrested him after a pursuit near I-275. Prosecutors charged him with aggravated murder. He remains held at the Warren County Jail, with his next court appearance set for July 27. A 911 caller who identified Cohen told dispatchers he had “unloaded a whole magazine into my coworker.” Court filings indicate Cohen left his job the week before the shooting. Fox19 obtained documents detailing the shot count and Cohen’s arrest.

Stoetzel’s community responded quickly. Friends describe him as a devoted husband to his wife, Maddie, and a mentor who spent his summers on volunteer outreach. A GoFundMe campaign for his family has drawn contributions from people who knew him growing up. Mason police noted the case is unusual for the city too. The department rarely handles homicides, and this is Mason’s only fatal shooting so far this year. WCPO has coverage.

Case #26-0724-01 — Winton Hills, Craft Street and Winneste Avenue, July 24
Someone shot a juvenile in the arm around 8:30 p.m. Friday. Paramedics took the victim to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Police haven’t released suspect information. This marks the second shooting in Winton Hills within six days. WCPO covered the initial report.

Case #26-0725-01 — Clifton Avenue and Lang Street, July 25
Cincinnati police described the location as Over-the-Rhine in the initial report. Officers responded to Clifton Avenue and Lang Street around 6 a.m. Saturday for a shooting, and one person went to the hospital. The extent of the injuries remains unknown, and police haven’t said whether they have a suspect. Fox19’s initial report is the only coverage available so far. This is a developing item; we’ll update it as police release more.

Cases That Moved

This section follows major criminal cases outside the week’s shootings when charges, arrests or court rulings move them forward, not only gun violence.

Case #26-0716-01 — Norwood Lateral, Metro bus crash (crash: July 16; plea: July 24)
Metro driver Kyle Taylor pleaded not guilty Friday to a second-degree misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter charge in the July 16 crash that killed Cincinnati Department of Public Services worker Jonathan Young, 46. The same week, Fox19 reported that court records show Taylor has 12 prior traffic convictions dating back to 2010. That detail feeds directly into the broader accountability question Cincinnati Exchange examined this week. That history gives added weight to what Metro changed after settling a separate wrongful-death lawsuit last year, and whether those changes were in place before the July 16 crash.

Case #26-0517-01 — Covington, Hat Trick’s Sports Bar (shooting: May 17; arrest: July 23)
Officers arrested Franklin Smith, 44, at a Sharonville hotel this week. That’s more than two months after someone critically wounded a security guard at Hat Trick’s Sports Bar on Madison Avenue. The Hamilton County Regional SWAT team assisted. The operation was coordinated across Covington police, Sharonville police, the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Regional Narcotics Unit and an ATF task force. Fox19 reported Smith faces a first-degree assault charge. Local 12 reported Hamilton County booked him on an assault warrant and a charge of possessing a handgun as a person with felony convictions. Extradition to Kenton County is still pending, and the underlying case will proceed there.

According to the bar’s owner and the victim’s family, a security guard tried to take a drink away from a woman leaving with it. That’s what started the shooting. He’d worked at the bar for nine years. The shooter hit him three times, including once in the head. He underwent brain surgery, and his family initially described his condition as “touch and go.” He has since stabilized. Covington also revoked the bar’s liquor license in May. The city cited its failure to keep an officer on-site after 1 a.m., a requirement imposed following earlier complaints. The victim’s family has publicly opposed that revocation. They argue the bar shouldn’t lose its license over one person’s actions. Local 12 covered this week’s arrest.

Still Unresolved

Case #26-0719-01 (Montez Yett) remains the week’s most significant open case. Police have released no suspect information as of this writing. This section will track it in future editions until there’s an arrest, or until the case goes cold enough to warrant its own separate look.

By the Numbers

A single week doesn’t tell you much on its own. Here’s the citywide context, based on the most recent Cincinnati police data available, year-to-date through late June. Fox19 reported it earlier this month.

• Shooting incidents citywide sit slightly below last year’s pace: 103 so far in 2026, versus 105 at the same point in 2025.
• Total shooting victims are up, though: 132 this year compared with 120 last year, an increase of 12.
• Non-fatal injuries drive almost all of that increase. They rose to 106 from 89. Fatal shooting victims actually declined, to 26 from 31.
• In the Central Business District specifically, shooting incidents dropped to 6 from 8. Fatal victims there rose to two, up from zero at this point last year.

The short version: Cincinnati recorded slightly fewer shooting incidents through late June than at the same point last year. It recorded more victims, though. The cited totals work out to about 1.28 victims per incident in 2026, compared with 1.14 in 2025, roughly a 12% increase. Downtown’s shootings, while less frequent, have turned fatal more often this year than last. None of this week’s cases show up in those numbers yet; they’ll appear in the next data update. This connects to broader questions Cincinnati Exchange asked about the city’s public safety strategy heading into 2026.

The Winton Hills shooting is The Weekly Pattern

Winton Hills experienced both a homicide and a non-fatal juvenile shooting within six days. The Mason case, meanwhile, unfolded at a workplace. That’s different from the nightlife or transit-adjacent locations behind most of this summer’s earlier violent incidents. The Covington arrest is a reminder that violence connected to bars and late-night businesses is still working its way through the courts. That’s true even for cases that started months earlier.

The citywide numbers above can’t measure this entire roundup, though. Mason and Covington fall outside Cincinnati police jurisdiction, so those cases can’t stand up against the city’s own totals. Within the city itself, the two Winton Hills shootings are enough to flag the neighborhood for follow-up. They’re not enough to establish a new trend on their own.

What We’re Watching Next Week

Montez Yett’s killing remains publicly unresolved. David Cohen is due back in court July 27. Cincinnati police have released little beyond the location and hospitalization in Saturday’s OTR shooting. Those are the three files that will determine whether next week’s edition records progress or simply carries the same cases forward.

Readers with information on any of this week’s open cases can contact Crime Stoppers at 513-352-3040. Anyone affected by the violence covered here, not just witnesses with tips, can reach the Ohio Victim Assistance hotline at 800-582-2877 for support and resources.