In a press conference called with 19 minute notice to the media on a Friday after work before a holiday weekend, the city of Cleveland announced that administrative and internal disciplinary charges were filed against the officers involved in the shooting and killing of Tamir Rice but didn’t announce the specific charges.
The assembled leaders — Frank Jackson, Chief Williams, deputy chief Wayne Drummond, and public safety director Mike McGrath — took questions in the most nominal sense of the word. They said the charge letters would be released after the press conference and that questions could then be directed to City Hall spokesman Dan Williams and police spokeswoman Jennifer Ciaccia, thus allowing the city officials to abscond without answering any direct questions.
“As you know we’ve been conducting the adminstrative side of the investigation around the shooting in November 2014 of Tamir Rice,” said Frank Jackson, who said little else during the affair, to open the presser. “The criminal side has been completed and you also know there was a settlement on the civil side. The only thing left in regard to the procedure is that of the administrative side.”
(Update: The charge letters for Timothy Loehmann, Frank Garmback and William Cunningham are embedded in full below. All the charges for Loehmann stem from his lying on his application for Cleveland, specifically omitting his problems as an officer in Independence that led to him resigning from the suburb instead of being fired. No charges relate to his actions on the day he shot Tamir Rice.)
One of the officers, Chief Williams said, will come before him directly for violation of department rules and procedures. While declining to get into specifics, officials broadly stated that charges for the officers ranged from adminstrative violations to violations of the use of force policy. Williams said he made the recommendations to public safety director Mike McGrath after reviewing the report from the critical incident committee, impaneled by Mayor Jackson and led by Wayne Drummond.
Public safety director Mike McGrath said that pre-disciplinary hearings will be scheduled for this month.
In addition, the city noted that “the Department of Public Safety Quality Control Office conducted an investigation into the hiring of Patrol Officer Timothy Loehmann, specifically the application documents filed by Loehmann.”
The two main officers: Frank Garmback, who was driving the cruiser, and Timothy Loehmann, who shot and killed Rice. Officer Cunningham, who was also mentioned, was off duty and working a secondary job at the Cudell rec center.
This article appears in Jan 11-17, 2017.
Thank you for keeping us updated on this case!
What about the dispatcher who didn’t relay all of the information to the officers?
The one question that will never be answered (since it hammers into the hiring practices of the city): who recommended the pair of dolts for the jobs they were not qualified to hold.
Am I reading this correctly? Garmback faces discipline for his conduct at the Tamir Rice shooting, but Loehmann does not?
HITH is that possible?
Madeline, Garmback drove the cruiser right up next to the suspect with the gun. To be fair he gave Loehman little choice but to decide immediately if the suspect was pulling a gun. It’s sad but the veteran made the move that ignited the situation. This doesn’t mean I am pro-police or pro Loehman in this situation, just I believe Garmback was the biggest fool in the situation. If it had been a bad guy with a gun both officers could have been killed before they got out of the car.
I read this article in The NY Times which totally vilified the officers involved by twisting the story into saying Tamir was playing with a toy pellet gun, he was reported to be probably juvenile with a probable toy gun. First off there is no such thing as a toy pellet gun, it was an actual pellet gun which looks very similar if not identical to an actual gun that fires live rounds. And to say he was probably juvenile with a possible fake gun leaves too many variables left for the police to determine in a split second. Is a juvenile with a gun any less dangerous than an adult with a gun? Impossible to determine in a split second if you’re an officer who just had a firearm pointed at him. It’s certainly tragic this young boy lost his life, but instead of vilifying the police, who we entrust to insure our safety, while putting their own lives on the line. Why don’t we ask the question of where were the parents of Tamir? Why did they allow him to leave the house and play with a weapon, pellet gun or not? We as a country and especially those in the media need to stop placing the blame on the police. It only undermines their authority and makes their job that much more difficult to perform. In the world we live in today, now more than ever we need to support those who protect us.
What about the dispatcher who didn’t relay all of the information to the officers?
I know Garmback acted in a way that made Tamir’s homicide almost inevitable. Not that I excuse Loehmann for executing a child. But yes, of the three letters above, one is approximately correct.
What kind of city is this, that black children’s lives are less valuable than stupid, racist, inept men’s jobs — jobs that we all agree none of these three are qualified to hold?
If the city and county won’t prosecute this murder, why won’t the state or the feds? How can these crimes go unpunished in America?
I will never, ever understand.