Two reports from a former Denver prosecutor and former FBI agent conclude that the police were justified in shooting 12-year old Tamir Rice.
Rice was shot and killed by Timothy Loehmann, an officer in training, on November 22, 2014 after Loehmann responded to a 911 call of a “a guy in here with a pistol, pointing it at everybody.” While the caller admitted the gun was likely fake, he added, “He’s scaring the s*** out of people.” The caller’s description that the gun was likely fake was not relayed to the officers who responded to the call, and the gun turned out to be a BB gun.
Denver’s Senior Chief Deputy District Attorney S. Lamar Sims wrote in a report that the police shooting Rice was “objectively reasonable.”
“There can be no doubt that Rice’s death was tragic and, indeed, when one considers his age, heartbreaking,” Sims wrote. “However, for all of the reasons discussed herein, I conclude that Officer Loehmann’s belief that Rice posed a threat of serious physical harm or death was objectively reasonable as was his response to that perceived threat.”
The former FBI agent, Kimberly Crawford, wrote that Loehmann’s actions fell “within the realm of reasonableness under the dictates of the Fourth Amendment … Loehmann’s attention would be focused on Rice’s hands as they moved towards his waist band and lifted his jacket. Unquestionably, the actions of Rice could reasonably be perceived as a serious threat to Officer Loehmann.”
“I conclude that Officer Loehmann’s belief that Rice posed a threat of serious physical harm or death was objectively reasonable as was his response to that perceived threat.”
Senior Chief Deputy District Attorney S. Lamar Sims
In the video of the shooting, Rice reaches for his waistband when the police order him to put his hands up. He was shot within two seconds of the police arriving.
When the shooting happened, the media rushed to judgment on the incident and immediately blamed the police. In an op-ed in The Washington Post, Jonathan Capehart wrote that “the Cleveland response to the Rice family lawsuit is but further proof that African American men and boys must live their lives beyond reproach, devoid of mistakes and bad choices at any age, if they are to avoid being blamed for their own death.”
Columnist Charles Blow echoed Capehart’s sentiments by writing in The New York Times the shooting was “an unconscionable level of human depravity on the part of the officer who shot him, a stunning disregard for the value of his life and a callousness toward the people who loved him.”
Black Lives Matter activist Shaun King- who isn’t even black– called the shooting a “senseless killing.”
And yet, two separate reports from credible sources on the issue of law enforcement say that the Rice shooting was “objectively reasonable.” Rice’s family has dismissed the sources as “pro-police” without substantiating their claim. This incident, while tragic, shows that once again the media rushes to judgment before all the facts come out. We live in a country where we face trial by jury, not trial by media.