A Tragedy in a Small Town

Vol. III, No. 265 - How a Small Town Police Department Communicated Through a Difficult Time

These are the stories that aren’t so hard to write, but hard to really get a solid angle. Ealier this week, there was a homicide in our county. One that gripped the headlines of every local media source and brought national attention to the community.

It was a story that was picked up bloggers and social media commenters. A lot of the information from those sources were more sensational than helpful; some of the information was untrue, or yet to be proven. It was painful to read these stories, even when I have tangential knowledge of the people involved.

All of the chatter has caused pain in a chaotic environment on social media where it became sometimes hard to tell fact from fiction. Social media didn’t exactly help. And while opinions and thoughts were freely shared, local police and investigators did their job.

It’s certainly not the mission of this publication to sensationalize a tragedy. But, as this orderal moved on, I kept on thinking about the police department and how they were communciating and what they were communicating. It was one part of the story that hasn’t been addressed and deserved some discussion. Today’s story goes not into the details of the crime, but rather, how a consistent and careful approach by a small town police department created an enviornment where community trust was reinforced, rather than lost.

Tipp City is the kind of place where people know each other. Where a mom who grew up in the town is remembered by name in the grocery store, where a volleyball coach’s players grow up seeing her as more than just someone on the sideline, and where an active church member’s absence is felt far beyond the walls of the building. Ashley Flynn was that kind of person — a 37-year-old mother of two young daughters who had woven herself into the fabric of this community in ways both large and small. Her loss was not just a tragedy for her family. It was a wound felt across an entire town.

When news broke in the early morning hours of February 16th that she had been killed inside her home on Cunningham Court, the shock that rippled through Tipp City was immediate and profound. And in a moment like that, a community’s anxiety does not wait for answers. It fills the space where information is absent. What Tipp City’s leadership did in the moments and days that followed is worthy of recognition — not because it was dramatic, but precisely because it was steady, honest, and human.

By 6:30 on the morning of the terrible incident, Tipp City Police Chief Greg Adkins had already released the department’s first statement to the public. It was factual without being cold, informative without compromising the investigation. Residents learned that Ashley Flynn had been killed in what was thought to be a home invasion. The department’s officers had secured the scene, deployed canines and a drone in a search for suspects, and that the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation was already on scene processing evidence. It gave comfort that the County Victim Witness Program was on the scene comforting the family and that the Police Department was continuing it’s work.

Later that morning, City Manager Eric Mack issued his own statement, offering condolences to the family and reminding residents that “Tipp City has always been a close-knit community, and moments like this impact us all”. That dual-voice approach — the law enforcement voice and the civic voice — set the tone for everything that followed and signaled to residents that their leaders were present, engaged, and taking this seriously.

Chief Adkins continued to provide updates the following day, making clear that investigators had worked through the night and that the department was not working alone. The partnerships formed quickly and deliberately: the Miami County Sheriff’s Office, the Miami County Prosecutor’s Office, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, and ultimately the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives all joined the effort. For a department that, like most municipal departments, operates with limited staffing, the willingness to reach out early and build that collaborative team was both a smart investigative decision and a reassuring signal to the community that no resource would be left untapped in the pursuit of answers.

Perhaps the most telling moment came on February 18th, when false rumors began circulating — through media outlets and social media — that a suspect was already in custody and had confessed. Chief Adkins addressed it directly and without equivocation. He called the information false, named it as harmful to the Flynn family, and then did something that speaks to genuine leadership: he reminded a grieving community that these investigations take time, that the family deserves a thorough and careful review of all available evidence, and that the department would not try the case in the media. It was a message that was simultaneously firm, compassionate, and civic-minded — and it reflected a chief who understood that his responsibility extended beyond the investigation itself to the emotional well-being of the people he serves.​

On the evening of February 19th, just over three days after Ashley Flynn’s death, an arrest was made and murder charges were filed against her husband. Chief Adkins closed his statement on the arrrest not with self-congratulation, but with gratitude — to his officers, his civilian staff, and every partner agency that had contributed to a thorough and professional investigation. He acknowledged plainly that investigations of this magnitude are especially challenging for agencies with limited staffing, and that the support of dedicated partners had been essential.​

In a difficult moment for this community, the City of Tipp City and its Police Department modeled what good public communication looks like. They were timely without being reckless, transparent without being careless, and compassionate without losing focus. A grieving community deserved that kind of leadership. Tipp City delivered it.

​A New Way to Support This Work

Our readers and subscribers have been asking for a new way to support the work being done here at Civic Capacity! Some of our readers do not like the idea of having to sign up for another subscription service. Some of our subscribers occasionally want to give more support through a one-time transaction.

Civic Capacity is partnering with “Buy Me A Coffee” to give our readers, subscribers and friends an opportunity to give one-time support to Civic Capacity. Personally, I don’t like coffee, but I will never turn down a nice iced tea. If you feel compelled to support this effort, just click the button below.

Thank you to L. Calvert for your generous support and the nice ice cold beverage!

Thanks for reading today’s Civic Capacity Newsletter! Please feel free to share this information with your friends and neighbors.

Also, please consider subscribing to our work. If you are a free subscriber, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. For less than $1 a week, you can get timely and conversational updates about the decisions that are impacting you and your community!