Feds decline to charge cops in Tamir Rice case

The Justice Department announced Tuesday that it will not file any federal charges against two Cleveland cops in the controversial 2014 killing of 12-year-old Tamir Rice.

Officials said Tuesday that video footage of the incident was inconclusive and did not warrant federal charges against the two officers.

Rice was playing with a pellet gun near a recreation center when a man waiting at a nearby bus stop called 911 to report someone brandishing a firearm.

He told the dispatcher that the person was likely a minor and that the weapon was possibly a toy — but that information was never relayed to responding cops.

Officer Timothy Loehmann, who came to the scene with partner Frank Garmback, fatally shot Rice soon after their arrival.

Both men argued that they ordered Rice to show his hands and that he was drawing the apparent weapon before being shot.

The footage, the Justice Department said, did not confirm or disprove those assertions.

The boy’s slaying set off protests and fueled ongoing national tensions over the use of police force against minorities.

A state grand jury previously declined to charge Loehmann with a crime.

In order to bring fresh federal raps, the Justice Department would have had to determine that he purposefully broke the law rather than exercised poor judgement.

Loehmann was fired from his department in 2017 after investigators learned that he had lied about his job history.

In his application, Loehmann obscured the fact that he was allowed to resign after a six-month probationary period with another department instead of being fired.

via: https://nypost.com/2020/12/29/cops-in-tamir-rice-case-will-not-be-charged-by-feds/

Photo Credit: AP