This past weekend yet another shooting of a young black male occurred, this time in Cleveland, Ohio. This event took place days before the country nervously awaited the trial proceedings of Officer Darren Wilson and the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The incident in Cleveland began Saturday night as police responded to a 911 call which stated "there's a guy in there with a pistol, you know, its probably fake, but he's like pointing it at everybody" the caller went on to say "he's sitting on a swing right now, but he's pulling it in and out of his pants and pointing it at people. He's probably a juvenile, you know?" Police later said it was not clear if the responding officers received the information about the suspect being a "juvenile" or the gun being "probably fake". When police arrived at the scene they encountered 12 year old Tamir Rice. Rice did not point his gun at the two officers or otherwise threaten them, but he did reach for his gun. The two officers ordered him to stop and to put his hands up however he reached in his waistband and pulled out his weapon according to reports. "Our officers at times are required to make critical decisions in a split second," Cheif Calvin Williams said "Unfortunately, this was one of those times." Rice succumbed from his wounds early Sunday morning at MetroHealth Medical Center after surgery was performed. After the incident, police recovered Rice's weapon, it was a large, black BB replica gun resembling a semiautomatic pistol. An orange tip indicating it was not a real firearm was removed leaving it indistinguishable from a live firearm. Residents of the neighborhood quickly angered by this event, one man told CNN "It wasn't a dog. It was a child. You didn't give him a chance. You just killed him." While this is true, the officers had no way to distinguish whether or not the gun was real or fake and according to head of the police union the two officers followed police protocol. While they followed protocol, both officers have been placed on leave following the incident.
Should the two officers involved in the shooting of 12 year old Tamir Rice be punished?
Should toy producers have greater restrictions on the similarity of appearances between their products and real guns?
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4 comments:
What the officers did was absolutely justified. Honestly, that kid was just an idiot for not complying. The officers probably had families and kids themselves, they weren't going to take the risk of letting someone draw what could be a weapon. Orange tip or not, officers don't mess around when someone tries to draw something after being told to put their hands up. He could have tried to draw a cell phone, and we would have gotten the same result. This is just a case of natural selection. The officers shouldn't be punished, and should be allowed to return to duty.
The appropriate laws are already in place for fake guns. The really realistic ones require an orange tip and the buyer to be a legal adult. While I can't be sure of the laws and regulations concerning the specific BB gun in question, until we know exactly what it was,I'm assuming that it's an airsoft gun, as those are required to have an orange tip and look very real. Given that, this is a case of irresponsible parenting. The appropriate laws are already in place. The kid shouldn't have been allowed to handle it without proper firearm safety training, let alone allowed to play with it in the park.
This story isn't really important, and neither is the race of the kid. This is just yet another example of the mainstream media racially slanting a minor story to play on racial tensions in America to make money. This story isn't about a shooting, it isn't about some dumb kid, it's simply about business.
Assuming that the officers really did have no way of knowing that the gun was fake (i.e. they didn't ignore a tip that it was probably fake), then they should not be prosecuted. The police officers should not take the risk of being shot just to find out whether or not the gun is fake. Rice would have lived if he had not deliberately acted as if the gun were real to threaten the officers.
Lines like "It wasn't a dog. It was a child" do little to change my opinion on these issues. Shooting a dog would actually be less rational, as a dog cannot draw a gun and kill in the blink of an eye. Anyone pointing a pistol at someone can expect their target to defend themselves regardless of the aggressor's age, race, or gender.
As far as I can tell, toy gun laws are fine as they are. It's more about how the fake weapon is handled than how many visual cues indicate that it is not real. Even a yellow plastic water gun could draw defensive shots if the holder were concealing the gun and making sudden movements after being told to put their hands up. Even if Rice's gun were a real gun (and thus had no indicator of being a toy), he would not have been shot if he had not drawn it.
Finally, I think that racial prejudice may have played a role in how they interpreted Rice's actions. The officers may have been more likely to believe the gun to be fake rather than real if it were in the hands of a blonde white girl instead. However, anyone who had complied with the officers would not have been shot, period.
I, and the good folks of the Video Production Club, use prop guns for movies. They purposefully look exactly the same as actual guns, and often use some of the same equipment (some stocks, sights, etc. can be used on either). We only use these props on private property, as in theory, an officer or bystander can't tell the difference by physical appearance alone.
That being said, there is such thing as context. Boys play with toy guns all the time-- from Nerf guns on up. The chance that a 12 year old playing around with a "gun" actually has a real gun is laughably small. Or at least it would be, if the kid wasn't dead.
If the cop isn't willing to take that kind of risk to save a child's life, he should go into another profession. Perhaps he can better serve society by frosting delicious cupcakes at the local bakery. The officer should be fired.
Jeremiah, I can see where you're going with the context angle, but I disagree.
I have experience with both replica and real firearms. For my own safety (love you Aragon administration!), I won't go into detail, but I could probably answer quite a few questions if I was asked any.
When something looks exactly like the real thing, that's quite a bit different from kids playing with nerf guns. I know officers, national gaurdsmen, and even SWAT guys. That "risk" can be the deciding factor between life and death for the responder. These guys have families too, if they can take less risk on the job, they will. A SWAT guy that I know gave the suspect the benefit of the doubt once, and only once. He ended up with a broken arm, and was out of work for a quite a while. The risks involved with hesitation just aren't worth it. That's the reality of this line of work.
Replica firearm aside, the kid would still be alive if he had listened to the officer. If he wasn't smart enough to realize what was going on, society as a whole is better off because his genes were removed from the gene pool.
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