Courtesy of CNN:
A Cleveland police officer shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice about two seconds after the officer and a partner pulled up in a car to investigate reports that someone was brandishing a gun at a park, surveillance video that police released Wednesday shows.
Tamir, who had what police said is an air gun that looked like a real firearm, died Sunday, a day after he was shot outside a recreation center.
Police also released two audio recordings Wednesday -- a 911 call preceding the shooting and a tape of a dispatcher asking officers to go to the park.
The shooting happened after a person called 911 to report that a black male -- "probably a juvenile" -- was pointing "a pistol" at people outside the recreation center. Twice the caller said the gun might be fake.
The dispatcher radioed to officers about a black male who was "pointing a gun at people," but did not mention that caller's belief that he could be a minor and that the gun might not be a real firearm, one of the released recordings shows.
I held off posting this until the day after Thanksgiving, since I did not want to ruin everybody's holiday.
However it is definitely something worth discussing as it is just one more example of a black person being shot by police officers.
I think his age might immediately bring up Trayvon Martin in a lot of people's minds, but personally my immediate connection was to the death of John Crawford III who was killed by police while holding a fake gun in Wal-Mart back in August. in this case like that one, police seemed to fire before taking the time to assess if the person actually presented a danger to them or to others.
Why the dispatcher did not relay the information of child's age or the caller's beleif that the gun was fake We will probably never know, but it seems clear that if they had done so this young man would still be alive.
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