Cleveland Police Kill 12-Year-Old African-American Boy Carrying Fake Gun
As America continues to reel from the killing of Michael Brown in Missouri, news has spread from Ohio that a black child was shot by local authorities Saturday afternoon while carrying a replica gun at a playground.
As America continues to reel from the killing of Michael Brown in Missouri, news has spread from Ohio that a black child was shot by local authorities Saturday afternoon while carrying a replica gun at a playground. Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy described by his family’s lawyer as having a “baby face,” died Sunday morning from the wounds he’d received the day before.
BBC News:
A 12-year-old boy has died after being shot by police in the US city of Cleveland, after carrying what turned out to be a replica gun in a playground.
Police say an officer fired two shots at Tamir Rice after he failed to obey an order to raise his hands.
He did not make any verbal threats nor point the gun towards the officers…An audio recording of the 911 emergency call made by the man who reported the incident reveals that on two occasions he said that the pistol was “probably a fake” and on another occasion that the person holding it “was probably a juvenile”…But Jeff Follmer, president of the Cleveland police association, said the two officers at the scene were not told about the caller’s comments.
Read More.
Twitter users commented on the question of race involved in this case in a variety of ways.
Blackness means not even a 12-year-old, baby-faced child who’s playing outside a recreation center gets the benefit of the doubt. #TamirRice
— Melinda D. Anderson (@mdawriter) November 24, 2014
12 year old #TamirRice was shot by Cleveland police for carrying a BB gun. He just died. And yes, he was black.
This is your America.
— Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) November 23, 2014
Semi-regular reminder that James Holmes, who shot 82 people in Aurora, was peacefully taken into custody, wearing body armor. #TamirRice
— Hank Single (@Hanksingle) November 24, 2014
—Posted by Natasha Hakimi Zapata
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