LF: Police Union Sues Toy Gun Maker For Not Doing Enough To Keep Cleveland Cops From Killing 12-Year-Old Boys

Title: Police Union Sues Toy Gun Maker For Not Doing Enough To Keep Cleveland Cops From Killing 12-Year-Old Boys
Source: TechDirt
URL Source: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/2 ... killing-12-year-old-boys.shtml
Published: May 5, 2017
Author: Tim Cushing
Post Date: 2017-05-07 11:21:57 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 5160
Comments: 12

from the who-will-it-sue-now-that-it's-shot-itself-in-the-foot? dept

In the world of law enforcement, there's very little more ridiculous than police unions. That's the unfortunate side effect of feeling compelled to defend every "bad apple," no matter how rotten they are. The Cleveland police union has reached the apotheosis of law enforcement spin -- this time taking the form of a lawsuit that looks like a punchline.

First, some backstory. In 2014, 12-year-old Tamir Rice was killed by a Cleveland police officer as he played with a toy gun in the park. A caller reported Rice, saying he was waving around a gun. The caller also said it was likely the person they saw was a juvenile and the gun was likely a toy. This information was not passed on to the responding officers, who boldly/stupidly raced across the park lawn to within feet of where Rice was standing and shot him two seconds after exiting their vehicle. The "gun" Rice had was an Airsoft replica with the bright "not a gun" tip removed.

Had the dispatcher passed on the mitigating factors, Tamir Rice might still be alive. Had the officers decided to approach this tactically, rather than like an out-of-control half of a buddy-cop movie cliche, Tamir Rice might still be alive. But, as the Cleveland Patrolmen's Association sees it, the problem wasn't bad communication and worse tactics. The real problem here is toy gun makers.

The Cleveland Patrolmen's Association announced it will soon be filing a lawsuit against toy gun manufacturers in federal court.
CPPA attorney Henry Hilow told News 5 the civil lawsuit will not seek financial damages, but rather seek to restrict the design of toy guns, so they don't look so realistic.
"These fake weapons put the community at risk, puts law enforcement at risk, something has to be done," Hilow said. "The remedy that we'd be looking for is that that gun could not replicate. That that gun would be of such a color have such a tip."

Airsoft guns do look realistic, minus the bright orange tip that comes standard. Anyone can remove the tip… just like anyone can create a real gun that looks fake. None of that matters, though, as attempts to create vicarious liability tend to fall apart under judicial scrutiny. And, notably, the Cleveland Police Union has never attempted to sue the manufacturers of real guns, despite them being involved in almost every situation where officers have shot at people or been shot by them.

As Popehat pointed out on Twitter, this is likely only the first of many police union lawsuits:

Next to be sued by police: Coach for making wallets and God for making black people's hands and waistbands

So far, the CPPA stands alone in its jackassery. But it has hopes that others similarly situated will beclown themselves for the dismayed amusement of the nation:

He said the CPPA is looking for support from other police unions in major cities like Columbus and Dallas.

I applaud the union's willingness to take a stand in court against the maker of an item held by a person one of its members killed. Anything that draws more attention (albeit inadvertently) to the trigger-happy tendencies of Cleveland police officers and the increasing ridiculousness of police union statements and actions is fine by me.

Nowhere in the article do they mention the parent(s). Or do they just show up when they file a lawsuit and the cameras are rolling?

The orange tip is there for a reason. You can't cut it off and pretend there's no difference. And you certainly can't go to a public park by yourself and start pointing the "gun" at people.

Which makes my point. These things can happen and a kid's dead because of it. I'd like to see the parents step up and take responsibility for their part in all this.

"Loehmann shouted from the car three times at Tamir to show his hands as he approached the car."

Moreover, you don’t pick up the “gun” from a table, put in in your waistband, start walking towards a police officer, take your arm up and raise your jacket, then reach in your waistband and remove the“gun.”

The video showed that and the grand jury decided that reason to indict the officers.

But not before Tamir had picked up the “gun” placed it in his waistband and started walking towards the car where Loehmann was yelling from the car for Tamir to show his hands. Then, Tamir lifted his arrm, raised his jacket and reached inside his waistband to remove the gun and he was shot. The “gun” was found lying on the ground.

Obviously the dispatcher was negligent in failing to pass on the callers opinion to the police that it was likely a toy gun. That was a major fail.

International Orange colored tips for toy guns are a useful safety device, and parents & kids are best off with them instead of without them. However, it's obviously not a cure all for these incidents. The fall out from any legislative action to ensure toy guns get orange tips might be for hardened criminals to modify real guns to have a similar colored tip. That could give them the jump on any police encounter and make a big difference in who gets shot, and after that, police would be much less likely to care if a gun has an orange tip or not, so the result could be much the same with kids with toy guns, with or without an orange tip getting shot. But maybe thugs modifying real guns like that isn't likely.

But kids living on the lower economic scale are always playing with toys that are broken. Heck even middle class kids do that. We know how kids are. So even if all guns had orange tips there will always be kids playing with toy guns with it broken off, whether with or without parents consent or even knowledge.

People do die in unfortunate, unlikely cases, and it's a mistake to overreact and pass laws to try to prevent anyone from dying from any unlikely cause. What you end up with is a society without freedom where everyone is permanently jailed in their own homes at all times. The bureaucracy is thick enough in the USA.

As for who's at fault in this killing, the dispatcher was the most at fault. I won't judge the responding cops on this one, but only they know. The kid probably should have been educated about the danger of having a toy gun in the presence of police, but probably thought police are never any danger which was his mistake. Ditto on that point for the parents, and maybe they should have destroyed the broken toy gun. Maybe. I'm sure they wish they had, obviously, but hindsight is always 20/20.

Kinda tough for the kid to comply when the cops gun him down before he even has a chance to comply.

The police officers simply don’t know what a juvenile will do with a “gun.”

On the other hand, this 12-year old boy cuts of the orange tip of authentic look-alike gun, goes to a public park and starts pointing the "gun" at people. Then when the police arrive he puts the “gun” in his waistband, whereby he is told three time to show his hands. He then reaches into his waistband, and is shot as he removes the “gun” and his family shows up to collect a $6 M lawsuit settlement.

It is as misterwhite said: “I'd like to see the parents step up and take responsibility for their part in all this.”

It shows a real gun next to the replica gun 12-year-old Tamir Rice had the day he was shot dead by a Cleveland, Ohio, police officer.

Remember, you are looking at full profiles, while the officer was able only to see the grip and the “gun” being pulled from the waistband.

The boy said he warned Tamir to be careful because the pellet gun "looked real." Tamir stored the gun in a backpack when the two arrived at the recreation center just after 11 a.m., but witnesses said they saw Tamir pointing the gun and shooting at car tires that afternoon.

from the who-will-it-sue-now-that-it's-shot-itself-in-the-foot? dept

“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul

Those who most loudly denounce Fake News are typically those most aggressively disseminating it.

“Truth is treason in the empire of lies.” - Ron Paul

Those who most loudly denounce Fake News are typically those most aggressively disseminating it.