The Cleveland police officer who gunned downed 12-year-old Tamir Rice will not face any criminal charges, prosecutors announced today. The officer, Timothy Loehmann, fatally shot Rice seconds after arriving at at park on November 22, 2014. Rice was carrying a toy gun.
The investigation of Loehmann and his partner Frank Garmback by Ohio prosecutor Timothy McGinty has been drawn into question. At times, McGinty has conducted himself more like a defense attorney for the officers. McGinty solicited “expert” opinions from two individuals with a history of defending police officers which claimed the shooting of Rice was “objectively reasonable.” In October, he released those reports to the press.
McGinty said he recommended that the grand jury not issue an indictment and they declined to do so.
https://twitter.com/juanmthompson/status/681553648523018240
Prosecutor McGinty says Rice should have known better before playing in the park, because he "looked older"
— Kate Aronoff (@KateAronoff) December 28, 2015
Last month, McGinty took a shot at Rice’s grieving mother, Samaria Rice, calling her “economically motivated.”
New from Rice Family – Prosecutor McGinty has been "abusing, manipulating" process to orchestrate no charges: pic.twitter.com/tlqdbwfdT0
— Ari Melber (@AriMelber) December 28, 2015
Rice’s family has repeatedly questioned the prosecution’s conduct. “This is apparently how long it takes to engineer denying justice to a family when the video of the incident clearly illustrates probable cause to charge the officer,” Subodh Chandra, an attorney for the family, said yesterday.
Update:
Some parts of this post initially confused Officer Garmback’s name with Prosecutor McGinty. These sections have been updated.