Official Police Story About Shooting Of 14-Year-Old Begins To Unravel

[KamaAina]

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/08/17/3692333/investigation-pokes-holes-in-official-police-story-for-why-they-shot-a-14-year-old-boy/

When Radazz Hearns was shot seven times by police in Trenton, New Jersey earlier this month, police claimed the 14-year-old pulled out a gun and attempted to shoot them while running. Now, the attorney general’s office says those allegations are unsupported, and an eyewitness says Hearns was actually unarmed and trying to pull up his pants as he ran.

According to the attorney general’s office, Hearns was one of three teenage boys questioned by three Targeted Integrated Deployment Effort (TIDE) officers near an apartment complex, after a shooting was reported nearby. An anonymous police source alleged Hearns ran away from the cops and reached for what the officers thought was a gun. At one point, they say, Hearns turned around while running and attempted to shoot at them. The three officers opened fire, hitting Hearns seven times in the legs and butt.

Eyewitness Rhonda Tirado, who watched the chase and shooting from her home, paints a different picture of what happened. Tirado alleges the boys were laughing and joking for 15 minutes before the cops arrived near her house, and agrees that the three males were confronted by the officers. She also contends Hearns tried to flee. But Tirado says the teenager looked like he was trying to pull his pants up — not grabbing a weapon....

The attorney general’s office has since conducted a preliminary investigation and concluded that the anonymous police source’s claims are inconsistent with its findings. The family attorney representing the 14-year-old’s family, Samuel Anyan Jr, maintains Hearns was unarmed. A .22-caliber handgun was discovered at the scene later, but investigators have not connected the weapon to the boy.

[frylock]

1. fuck tha police

[KeepItReal]

2. These abusive and killer cops are indistinguishable from the Ku Klux Klan

And yeah, even the ones of color until they prove otherwise.

[DirkGently]

3. Shot in the posterior while running and shooting ... backward?

Running away is not a killable offense, officers.

Jesus.

[Kelvin Mace]

4. Actuallly, it is

according to the Supreme Court:

Tennessee v. Garner, 1985

...under the Fourth Amendment, when a law enforcement officer is pursuing a fleeing suspect, he or she may not use deadly force to prevent escape unless "the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others."

It was a 6-3 ruling. It was a "liberal" ruling that created a loophole all police hide behind.

[DirkGently]

6. That ruling's not really the problem.

The older "fleeing felon" laws -- where the police could use lethal force on anyone they thought might have committed a felony -- were struck down a while back. Those were an invitation to kill whoever.

There's a difference between lethal force on, say, an armed carjacker running toward a school bus, and officers pulling this "thought he reached for his waistband" stuff where the only crime is running from the police in the first place.

[Kelvin Mace]

8. The loophole relies on the officer

to make the call. If the officer believes the suspect poses a threat to himself or others, he may use deadly force. All the cop has to do is get on the stand and say "I BELIEVED the suspect was a threat to me" and he walks.

Unless there is a HUGE amount of evidence to call that statement into question, that is the way it has been since the ruling. Prior to the ruling the police could simply execute you if you ran as long as they claimed to believe you committed a felony. Today they can execute you if you run by simply claiming you were a threat. The severity of your suspected crime is irrelevant.

[DirkGently]

10. "Probable cause" is not mere "belief."

While it may seem like police officials can give any flimsy reason in place of probable cause, it's a Constitutional term and does not equate to mere belief.

It's a "reasonable person" standard, generally.

In Brinegar v. United States, the U.S. Supreme Court defines probable cause as “where the facts and circumstances within the officers' knowledge, and of which they have reasonably trustworthy information, are sufficient in themselves to warrant a belief by a man of reasonable caution that a crime is being committed.”[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probable_cause

[Kelvin Mace]

12. This is one of nice little legal debates

that lawyers seem to love. Trouble is, it has no reflection on what happens in the real world. It is RARE that a police officer suffers any penalty for shooting a fleeing suspect. "Probable cause" is what the policeman says it is, and juries, especially grand juries tend to take their word for it.

(Not a dig at you, btw, just a frustrating observation by someone who lost his mother to a drunk driver who was also a police detective and had a DA lie right to their face while holding proof of their lie).

[DirkGently]

13. No question about the abuse and erosion

of the Constitutional ideal here. The law is essentially what we all say it is.

And I hear you saying you have first-hand experience of that abuse in practice in the most horrifying way. It's rampant and repugnant and utterly unacceptable, and I am more sorry than I can say in this forum to hear what happened to your family.

But we do have the principles in place to do better. These words are supposed to have meaning, and they can again, if (and only if) we all insist on it.

[Kelvin Mace]

14. Oh, I quite agree

Thank you for reminding me their are still some people who believe this.

[Sissyk]

5. I've been following this young death on twitter

thanks to deray.

Horrible!

[VMA131Marine]

7. Death?

Article says he was released from hospital yesterday.

[Sissyk]

9. You are correct.

THere are so many, I got it confused with another. THAT's a crying shame!

[seveneyes]

11. thinkprogress will get to the bottom of it

Rest assured. Nothing is as it doesn't seem.