NEW YORK — The two Cleveland police officers involved in the fatal shooting of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy who was carrying a pellet gun, stood by without rendering medical aid as the boy lay wounded next to their patrol car, a newly released extended surveillance video shows.
Then, about a minute and a half after one officer had shot Tamir, the other officer tackled the boy’s 14-year-old sister as she tried to reach her brother. Tamir was shot Nov. 22 after someone called 911 to report “a guy” who had been pointing a “probably fake” pistol outside a community recreation center on Cleveland’s west side.
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The video, which was obtained by the Northeast Ohio Media Group, seemed to clarify an issue in the shooting investigation: that the Cleveland officers provided no immediate medical assistance to Tamir, who was not pronounced dead until more than nine hours later at a Cleveland hospital.
It also confirmed the account that Tamir’s mother, Samaria Rice, told in the weeks after the shooting, that the police had tackled and detained her daughter as she rushed out of the recreation center, trying to reach her brother’s side.
After the second Cleveland officer, Frank Garmback, subdued Tamir’s sister — he pushed her to the ground. The girl was handcuffed and put in the back of the police cruiser, a few feet from her brother.
The officers then stood by without tending to Tamir, the extended video showed. It was not until four minutes after the shooting, the video showed, that Tamir received medical assistance when another man was seen bent down next to him. According to the Rice family’s lawyer, Benjamin Crump, the man who provided the first medical assistance was an FBI agent who was in the neighborhood.
Paramedics arrived eight minutes after the shooting, and Tamir was taken away on a stretcher about five minutes later, the video shows.
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