On Boys with Guns!

JUST SAY'n...Looking at the video of young Tamir Rice playing with a fake gun, a pellet gun, but in his mind, a toy gun, my mind immediately went back some 50 Christmas seasons ago. Anyone raised in the 60s, particularly if you were a boy, will have memories of Christmas mornings waking up to a toy cowboy set of hat, holsters and guns. They could be just plastic, cap or even BB, but there were ALWAYS guns for Christmas. Watching little Tamir walking around, BY HIMSELF, pointing the toy gun at his imaginary "bad guys" I thought, "he's just a kid, playing with a gun...how could this go so wrong"? And I'm still thinking that. I have to say, that I read a statement accompanying a video prior to actually seeing it, and the person said that he looked like a "grown man". I didn't see that in this video. I saw a little boy, playing with a gun...and so did those police officers. They saw a little boy getting up from that gazebo with a toy gun, that's why they drove right up to him close enough to almost hit him with the door as the initial officer fell out the door to fire while falling to the ground. They saw a little boy, a little Black boy, because, had he been a man with a REAL gun, they would have used more caution. They would have parked far enough away to actually GIVE the three vocal commands they claim to have given to put the weapon down, as Tamir unwittingly walked right into a firing officer. They fired and Tamir NEVER even raised his "weapon" at them. He never had opportunity to "raise his hands"...The kid was walking over to what he thought were friendly faces.

Police officers don't want the federal government meddling with their "police work", yet they continue to permit their own to murder and walk away to "THEIR families" while grieving families are left to try and figure out what happened. No shots had been fired at any civilians; Again, I say, no one was near a kid sitting in what appeared to be a bus stop gazebo, the kid did not make threatening gestures nor did he attempt to raise his hands to point the weapon at the officers. 

Yes...it's understood that the majority of gun fights involving police officers are close range; that's what officers say. But I will counter that they are also with REAL threats, not with little boys playing with a pellet gun and snowballs. What will the "get over" narrative be this time? "He looked like a grown man", "His gun looked like a real gun", "He didn't raise his hands before I could count 1 Mississippi"? There will be something, Some Prosecutor will look at the evidence and decide which best fits the officer's story and discard the rest. Hopefully this time, despite the popular notion that video's don't matter, that officers walk even with evidence, hopefully THIS time JUSTICE will FINALLY be served......JUST SAY'n.