Can YOU Tell Which One of These Is A Fake Gun? It’s The One Tamir Rice Was Holding
Do you think the cops had reason to think Tamir Rice was holding a real gun?
In the wake of the grand jury decision not to indict the cops responsible for fatally shooting 12-year-old Tamir Rice, prosecutors have released an image that gives insight into what may have led to the controversial decision.
The picture shows two guns – one a real Colt M1911 handgun and the other a replica of the toy gun Rice pulled out of his waistband and aimed at Cleveland, Ohio police officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback the day he was shot dead in November 2014.
Rookie cop Loehmann said it was his fear that the airsoft gun Rice was holding was real that caused him to shoot the young boy dead in a park.
The gun in the top left is the replica of the gun that Tamir was playing with that day, and it was missing an orange cap on the tip of the barrel that would have identified it as a toy. Without the cap, prosecutors say it was ‘functionally identical’ to a real handgun.
‘Even to a trained eye, careful side-by-side comparison is required to notice the differences,’ the Cuyahoga County prosecutor’s report released Monday reads.
‘During the tense, uncertain and rapidly unfolding moments of an actual encounter, the officer facing a suspect carrying what appears to be a gun often does not know if it is real or fake. Worse, the officer will know that if he guesses wrong, that may be the end of his life,’ the report added.
Read more: Daily Mail
