Source: Muhammad Farhad / Getty
Police violence doesn’t take days off. It could be your momma’s birthday, Christmas, Easter, or Thanksgiving: An officer is going to pull out their weapon and shoot a non-threatening person dead.
According to The Guardian, a Black 15-year-old Akron, Ohio, boy named Jazmir Tucker was gunned down by a police officer on Thanksgiving Day, and the body camera video from the incident has been released to the public. The video doesn’t give a clear view of what took place prior to the shooting, but it clearly shows that the officer fired almost immediately upon encountering Tucker.
Two officers, including the one in question, reportedly heard gunshots and began walking the streets to investigate. When they saw Tucker, the boy began to run and after a very brief chase, the officer fired approximately seven rounds in his direction. Tucker lay motionless on the ground and was not even approached for medical care for 10 minutes.
“In hindsight, the amount of time that expired between the shooting and the initiation of physical aid to Jazmir is deeply troubling to me,” Akron’s mayor, Shammas Malik, said in a statement on Thursday, alongside the release of the footage. “I want to be clear that any unreasonable delay in the rendering of aid by police officers is unacceptable and has no place in Akron.”
Jazmir’s family’s attorney, Robert Gresham, released a statement about the shooting following the release of the body camera footage.
When police finally approached Jazmir’s body and searched him, they found a pistol inside a zipped pocket of his coat. This proves that Jazmir was not threatening the officers and that there was zero need to use deadly force to end a foot chase.
“The police department did a number of things tactically wrong in this case, starting with the aggressiveness that they initiated this pursuit … These officers came out with the intent to do one thing: shoot and kill,” the attorney Robert Gresham said in a statement. “What I perceive to be the biggest issue here is there’s a culture of violence in this particular police department.”
Rest in peace, Jazmir Tucker. We hope the officer involved is charged and convicted.
