CLEVELAND (AP) — The mother of a 12-year-old boy fatally shot by a Cleveland police officer while carrying a pellet gun plans to publicly discuss recent developments in the case.
A statement from her attorneys says Samaria Rice will discuss the investigation during a news conference Tuesday afternoon at the Cleveland branch of the NAACP.
Her son, Tamir, was shot Nov. 22 while carrying an airsoft gun that shoots nonlethal plastic pellets. Police responded to a report of someone with a gun, and surveillance video shows Tamir being shot less than two seconds after the patrol car stops nearby.
Cleveland police announced last week that they’re handing over the investigation to the Cuyahoga (ky-uh-HOH’-guh) County Sheriff’s office to ensure transparency and impartiality.
Rice’s lawyers have said the family is optimistic about that move.
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Charges will likely be forthcoming, as they should be. Cleveland PD did not even vet this asshole, the previous PD he was at said he was unfit and unstable. Additionally, even if this kid DID have a gun, the cop did the absolute wrong thing by driving right up to him. If the gun is real, he puts his himself and his partner in immediate danger of being shot. You pull up from a safe distance, get out and crouch behind the door, and tell the person (kid) to drop the weapon. So even if this kid had a real gun, the cop was still wrong on how this was handled.
The 911 dispatch operator should also be looked at. He or she was told the weapon might be fake by the caller, yet they did not relay that info to the responding police. Still does not excuse how responding police handled it, but certainly that info should have been made available to them.
Other issues are why it is necessary to make toy guns that look so real, and why people take the orange stickers off that indicate they are fake. Not relevant in this case, but those also need to be addressed.