Pictured are 12-year-old Tamir Rice, his mother, Samaria Rice, and U.S. Attorney General William Barr
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog. Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, and who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview, CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief
CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, CLEVELAND, Ohio–As the fifth-year anniversary of the Cleveland police killing of 12-year-old Tamir Rice approaches on Nov. 22, Rice's mother, Samara Rice, and the Ohio ACLU have compiled an eight-page booklet in his memory to help other Black kids like Tamir stay safe in the midst of excessive force activities by Cleveland and other police targeted at the Black community, a national problem in largely Black major American cities across the country.
The guide, dubbed the 'Tamir Rice Safety Handbook' can be downloaded at the ACLU’s website and warns children to comply with police directives, and not to panic, among other recommendations.
Rice also remembered her son on the anniversary-week of his death with a series of events, including an evening of the arts at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Nov 20, an event featuring a conversation between internationally renowned artist Theaster Gates and journalist and activist Bakari Kitwana
Police were summoned to the Cudell Park and Recreation Center on the city's largely White west side on Nov. 22, 2014 following a foiled 9-1-1 call to police dispatchers that a child was carrying a likely toy gun.
Samara Rice has also established the Tamir Rice Foundation, and said she intends to do everything possible to protect other kids from what her son was subjected to by police, the city settling a wrongful death lawsuit brought by the family in 2016 for $6 million.
"Maybe I could go across the country to save some kids," the elder Rice told reporters on Wednesday.
Samara Rice said she is still grief-stricken and that "it does not get easier as the years go by."
The White Cleveland cop that gunned down Tamir Rice, rookie Timothy Loehmann, was fired , and his partner, also a White policeman, was handed a 10-day suspension, community activists applauding the firing of the killer cop and expressing dismay over the leniency in discipline of what they say is his partner in crime.
Loehmann and his partner, Frank Garmback, arrived at the scene and zoomed in on Tamir in less than two seconds, Garmback at the wheel of the police cruiser, precautionary action be damned.
Loehmann, however, was not fired for killing Tamir but for lying on his job application about discipline in another city as a former cop
Ongoing protests erupted nationally and locally in 2014 following the shooting death of Rice, and racial unrest continues to mount against a largely White police department now under a consent decree for police reforms between the city and the U.S. Department of Justice, a consent decree that follows several questionable Cleveland police killings of Blacks over the years, including Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell in 2012, and Tanisha Anderson in 2014.
The Cleveland Police Patrolmen's Association, led by outspoken union head Jeff Follmer, has been staunchly behind Loehmann and Garmback, Follmer saying the kid pulled the toy gun when police arrived, though no such evidence exist to prove such a claim.
A 9-1-1 dispatcher that answered the call from a bystander who allegedly said Tamir was pointing a likely toy gun when police anxiously arrived was suspended for eight days and an off-duty cop at the scene, for two days.
Neither the dispatcher nor the off-duty cop did the killing and both were disciplined by Police Chief Calvin Williams, who is Black, Constance Hollinger the dispatcher at issue, and William Cunningham, the off duty cop just simply on the premises, but allegedly without permission, city officials have said.
Loehmann and Garmback were not indicted on criminal charges with the help of since ousted Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty, who lost reelection in 2016 to fellow Democrat and current County Prosecutor Mike O'Malley, his ouster of which came in connection with community outcries relative to his pro-cop disposition in the Rice killing and other cop killings.
Samaria Rice has been in the forefront of community demands that the police involved in her son's killing face criminal proceedings, but to no avail
Follmer and his Cleveland Police Patrolmen's Association are President Donald Trump supporters, the police union endorsing Trump for his first bid for president, which was met with criticism from the Cleveland NAACP, Black leaders, and grassroots community activists, among others.
Trump has sent in his attorney general, William Barr, to meet with prosecutors, and Police Chief Williams and select cops for a roundtable discussion with law enforcement from across Northeast Ohio in Cleveland on Nov. 21, a political gesture as the 2020 presidential election nears and the president faces a pending impeachment inquiry, sources said.
Follmer has been criticized for backing wrongdoing fellow cops no matter what they do, some police union members speaking at a pro-Trump rally in downtown Cleveland since Trump became president, one of several protests held in a dozen cities across Ohio that day that garnered counter protests in Cleveland and elsewhere.
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog. Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, and who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview, CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
