From the 1955 murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till, to the fatal police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in 2014, the justice system has failed black children. Recently, a grand jury for the Tamir Rice case decided not to indict the rookie officer who shot and killed Rice. On November 22, 2014, Tamir Rice was playing outside at a recreation center in Cleveland when he was seen with a BB gun on a nearby swing. In a 911 recording, a witness said, “The guy keeps pulling it in and out…. It’s probably fake, but he’s pointing it at everybody. He’s probably a juvenile.” It’s unclear if dispatchers relayed this to the responding police officers. In a video recording of Rice’s death, it shows officers pulling up in a patrol car near the 12-year-old boy, immediately drawing their weapons and firing within seconds of exiting the car. Police reported that they yelled at the boy to put his hands up, and he did not. They report that he instead reached for his waistband. Rice was shot twice and died hours later.
According to a family friend, Rice was “tall for his age.” Jeffery Follmer, president of the Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association, told the media that “The officer had no clue he was a 12-year-old.” These words seem to echo those of the men who killed Emmett Till in 1955, claiming that he “looked like a man.” Emmett Till was murdered by a group of white men after flirting with a white woman, calling her “baby” when he said goodbye to her. These men forced Till to undress, and then proceeded to beat him, gouge his eye out, and shoot him in the head before dumping him in the Tallahatchie River. His body was found three days later, but was so disfigured, they had to identify the body based on an initialed ring he had been wearing. At the trial, an eyewitness identified Till’s murderers. The jury deliberated for less than an hour upon delivering a “not guilty” verdict, claiming the state hadn’t adequately proved the identity of the body.
These cases are outrageous, but not unique. A week after Tamir Rice’s death, with the family still reeling from the loss of the young boy, the Northeast Ohio Media Group decided to publish an article regarding the criminal records of his parents, titled “Tamir Rice’s Father Has a History of Domestic Violence.” This attempt to smear Rice’s character and diminish his case’s credibility was met with disgust and criticism, as it suggested that the child somehow deserved to be killed. Particularly in recent events, we’ve seen time and time again how young, unarmed black men are killed and our media attempts to justify their murders, using words like “thug” or claiming these men were “aggressive” and “violent,” even going so far as to claim that they were gang members. These words are used to subtly suggest that the murder of young black men is unsurprising, acceptable or that they somehow invited their deaths and therefore deserved to be killed. For example, in the 2012 case of the murder of Trayvon Martin, conservative news media labelled the 17-year-old as a “thief” and “wannabe gangsta,” claiming he’d stolen the tea and Skittles he was found with, as well as attacking his character for having been suspended from school at the time of his death. Martin had been suspended for tardiness, but this information was used to help portray the 17-year-old as a delinquent. Or take into consideration the 2014 case of the murder of Michael Brown. Brown was 18 years old and had recently graduated high school when he was shot by police officer Darren Wilson. Like Till, Rice, and Martin, Brown was black and unarmed. In his grand jury testimony, officer Wilson described Brown as “aggressive” and told the jury, “I felt like a 5-year-old holding onto Hulk Hogan. That’s how big he felt and how small I felt just from grasping his arm.” Despite this testimony, Wilson and Brown were actually the exact same height, and numerous eye witnesses reported seeing Brown having been shot when his hands were up in the air.
According to a study published by the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology titled "The Essence of Innocence: Consequences of Dehumanizing Black Children," "Black children are afforded the privilege of innocence to a lesser extent than children of other races,” and “that dehumanization of Blacks not only predicts racially disparate perceptions of Black boys but also predicts racially disparate police violence toward Black children in real-world settings.”
In reaction to the jury’s decision not to indict the officers who killed their child, Tamir Rice’s parents accused prosecutors of mishandling the case: “Prosecutor McGinty deliberately sabotaged the case, never advocating for [our] son, and acting instead like the police officers' defense attorney," they stated. "In a time in which a non-indictment for two police officers who have killed an unarmed black child is business as usual, we mourn for Tamir, and for all of the black people who have been killed by the police without justice. In our view, this process demonstrates that race is still an extremely troubling and serious problem in our country and the criminal justice system.”
This system has failed to serve and protect black children across America. Parents of children of color shouldn't be afraid to let their kids play outside for fear of them being shot, but they are. And when we ignore the injustices and racism that plague our society and instead yell "but not all cops," we miss the point entirely and offer no valid solutions to repair the problem.
