The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s report ruled Rice’s death a homicide.
(Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office)
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The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s report ruled Rice’s death a homicide.
(Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office)
Good.
Of course, so was Eric Garner’s.
True.
The video of the shooing was enough to prove that it was homicide.
But the real question is this, will a cop actually be punished for being murderously incompetent?
So I just read Working Stiff, which is about being a medical examiner. My understanding from that is that there are only so many categories for manner of death. For Ohio, they are homicide, suicide, accident, natural death, and unknown/undetermined. This was obviously not a suicide, an accident or natural death. Homicide in an autopsy basically means someone else directly cause this person’s death. Intent is irrelevant.
Sadly, this means nothing like what we want it to mean. Cribbed from my Tweets today:
1. IMPORTANT! Folks need to understand that “homicide” is a specific legal term of art. It does NOT mean, legally, “punishable murder.”
2. When you see “Coroner rules Tamir Rice’s death a homicide,” that doesn’t mean anything close to what most people think it means.
3. It does not mean the legal system has decided Rice was murdered. A homicide is simply that — “death by another man.”
4. The law recognizes justifiable homicides, for example. All killings by a person are homicides. Not all homicides are murders.
5. So the ME’s homicide finding isn’t new information. It is not any indication whatsoever that the law will consider it a punishable act.
6. The ME finding is just a formality, I’m sorry, but it’s true. We already knew Tamir Rice was killed by a person. That wasn’t in question.
What Anne Marie said.
It’s a start… now, we sit back and play the
waitingwatch as nothing at all happens game.What Josh said. This is just the technical description. Says nothing at all about whether the cops will face legal or even administrative sanctions.
As of now, they’re on paid administrative leave. Oh the HORROR!!!! A paid vacation!!!! When will the injustice END!!
@4 Anne Marie and @5 Josh, Official Spokesgay:
Thanks for the term clarification, you two.
So I should be even more angry at what the court/justice system considers justifiable, rather than that these cops seemed to be “getting away with” homicide…roger.
Yeah. Everyone else has written it – homicide is just intentional killing. Unfortunately, the law tends to allow that police officers can kill for very trivial reasons, such as feeling threatened. Whatever that may mean.
Ya. I was unclear on that.
My punishment is that I’ve now had it explained to me approximately 85 times.
It’s a fair cop, guv’nor.
Josh is correct. I’ve been on the victims side of this terminology. When the prosecutor was laying out the case against the young woman who hit my Dad, he was quick to point out that all deaths that could be attributed to another human action were classified as homicide.
http://criminal.findlaw.com/criminal-charges/homicide-definition.html
It was negligent homicide at least.
The way the cops rolled up on Tamir when there was no clear and present danger to anyone, headlights and spotlights pointing straight at him, the police likely screaming in an intense manner “DROP THE WEAPON!” How the fuck else was he supposed to react to that sudden traumatic event at the age of 12 years old?
Justifiable homicide. Just look at the victim’s race.