Brien Dyer, an admitted night owl, was watching a movie when he heard a faint "pop, pop, pop, pop" shortly after 1 a.m.

He dismissed the muffled report as firecrackers — or perhaps some of the random gunshots heard periodically in the night in his neighborhood a mile from Dayton's Oregon entertainment district.

When the retired psychiatrist awoke later on the morning of Aug. 4, he was horrified by the reality of the sounds he had heard hours earlier.

"I felt horribly about the people," he said of the nine killed in less than 30 seconds before the shooter died in a hail of police gunfire.

"It can't go on. We need change — universal background checks, a 'red flag' law and an assault weapons ban," said the 74-year-old Dyer.

Dyer was among about 150 people gathered outside the Statehouse on Wednesday afternoon as part of a call led by faith leaders for lawmakers to enact what the group billed as common-sense measures to help reduce gun violence.

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Dyer was joined by his pastor, the Rev. Monte Stevens, a Bexley native who serves North Riverdale Lutheran Church in Dayton.

Stevens, too, was haunted by the violence in Dayton. "The closer it gets, the more you want to jump in," Stevens said. "We want to help lawmakers see the carnage that is out here. We're not going away. We're in it until the end."

A series of speakers mounted the west side steps to address the crowd and call for action inside the Statehouse to stem gun violence.

"How many more lives will be sacrificed on the altar of easily available guns?" said the Rev. Jack Sullivan Jr., executive director of the Ohio Council of Churches, in calling out "absentee leadership."

"We give up our rights to remain silent," said Sullivan, whose sister, Jennifer, was shot to death in Cleveland in 1997.

David Eggert, director of Cleveland-based Ohioans for Gun Safety, denounced the Republican-controlled General Assembly as having made it increasingly easy to carry concealed guns in Ohio while not reacting to gun deaths.

"Our state legislators are not getting the job done. Either they enact common-sense gun regulations, or we will do it ourselves," said Eggert, whose group backs a petition drive to place a measure on the 2020 ballot to require universal background checks before gun sales.

An Ohio Senate committee conducted initial hearings Tuesday on Democrat-led and bipartisan gun bills, but they are unlikely to be the carriers of any change in the legislature.

After the Dayton attack, Republican Gov. Mike DeWine called for sweeping reforms, including background checks and the seizure of guns from those deemed dangerous in a court hearing. Six weeks later, no bills blessed by DeWine have emerged.

Senate President Larry Obhof, R-Medina, said Wednesday that "positive" talks with DeWine and his staff have continued in a bid to produce bills that can win legislators' approval.

"I think that the governor, that the lieutenant governor (Jon Husted), that the people they are working with, have worked very hard to try to come up with solutions that are respectful of gun owners' rights," Obhof said.

Advocates of new gun restrictions will continue to press their case Thursday. Nine Ohio mayors — and seven of their police chiefs — plan a news conference at the Statehouse at which they will call for legislators to pass the changes proposed by DeWine. The group is to include Dayton Mayor Nan Whaley and Police Chief Richard Biehl, and Columbus Mayor Andrew J. Ginther and interim Police Chief Thomas Quinlan.

On Saturday, hundreds of gun-rights supporters gathered at the Statehouse to protest any changes in gun laws.

rludlow@dispatch.com

@RandyLudlow