The chief of police in the US city of Cleveland on Monday defended the conduct of an officer who fatally shot a 12-year-old boy who was wielding a replica handgun.
Tamir Rice died in hospital early Sunday after two police officers, responding to a 911 emergency call, confronted the African-American youngster at a recreation center.
“There is no time that a Cleveland police officer wants to go out and shoot a kid, period,” Cleveland police chief Calvin Williams told a press conference.
He said the officer, whose name or racial group he did not disclose, and who has been placed on administrative leave, was “broken up about this.”
But he stood by the officer’s conduct, saying “he had to protect himself” in the face of what appeared to be, in the heat of the moment, to be a genuine firearm.
“The investigation — all the video evidence, all the scientific evidence — will show everyone exactly what happened,” he said.
Williams urged parents to educate their children on the dangers of firearms, including convincing replicas like the so-called “airsoft” BB gun Rice had been carrying.
“Our kids need to know that guns aren’t toys,” he said.
The incident came as Americans await a grand jury’s decision on whether to indict a white police officer in the St Louis, Missouri suburb of Ferguson for the fatal shooting in August of black teenager Michael Brown.
“Ferguson being out there, not being out there, doesn’t matter to me,” said Cleveland Mayor Frank Johnson.
“It’s about the child, the loss of his life, the grieving of the family” and the ability of the community to overcome a tragedy, he said.
In the coming days, Williams said, witnesses will be interviewed, video reviewed, forensic evidence examined and a statement taken from the officer concerned.
Once that is completed, the police chief added, “all evidence” will be turned over to local prosecutors.