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Tamir Rice Case Goes Before Grand Jury. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired December 28, 2015 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


[14:00:00] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: All right, we will take it on this Monday. Great to be with you all. I'm Brooke Baldwin. Let's begin with this breaking news here.

Any moment now, and we'll pop the live shot up, here you go, live from Cleveland. And you will see, as we're watching and waiting to hear from this Cuyahoga County prosecutor here in the case of Tamir Rice. You know the story. A 12-year-old. This was two Novembers ago. He was holding a gun, waving a gun around in a park. And ultimately police officers, once a caller called in, police officers rolled up very quickly and shot him. So what we're waiting for, and by the way there's a lot to this story, we're waiting to hear the prosecutor potentially revealing the grand jury's decision as to whether or not the officers in this case will be indicted.

I have sitting with me here Jean Casarez and our legal analyst Joey Jackson to sort of walk us through what we're anticipating to hear, whether or not this grand jury that's been meeting since October of this past year, whether or not there could be an indictment in this case.

But I think it's important -

JOEY JACKSON, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes.

BALDWIN: To walk through what we know so far because, again, number one, this was a 12-year-old -

JACKSON: That's right.

BALDWIN: In a park with a fake gun. Now, obviously, the person who called it in did not know the individual's age or the fact that the gun was fake. They were fearful and they called police. But the issue is police roll up and in seconds shoot him.

JACKSON: That's right.

JEAN CASAREZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. And the fact is, the dispatcher actually heard the person calling it in. I think it's a fake gun, but he's got a gun and he's aiming it at people. The dispatcher, from the facts that we know at this point -

JACKSON: Yes.

CASAREZ: Did not tell either officer that arrived at the scene that the person calling in the 911 call said that, I think it's a fake gun. BALDWIN: Or they -

CASAREZ: So their knowledge base didn't include that it may be a fake gun.

BALDWIN: Or that it was a child.

CASAREZ: Uh-huh.

JACKSON: Yes, they didn't get that translation. However, just, you know, going back, remember it's a grand jury and a grand jury is not deciding guilt or innocence, a grand jury simply determines two things, Brooke, really whether there's reasonable cause to believe that a crime was committed and whether these officers committed it. And there's a lot to be said for that issue and the process itself.

And, remember, a grand jury, 15 members of the grand jury, 12 have to make that decision in this particular jurisdiction and there's a lot that has gone on in terms of the length of time that it has even taken to get to this point. There was a delay in the proceedings. The proceeding began in mid-October in terms of the information that was given to the grand jury. Remember that a grand jury - in the grand jury, the prosecutor is the judge, jury and essentially the executioner. That's how you get the information. The prosecutor filters it in. And there's been a lot in the community in terms of the trust or the lack thereof of this prosecutor placing that case before the grand jury and actually getting an indictment as a result of that.

CASAREZ: And it's so ironic. A federal investigation began in 2012 of Cuyahoga County, which is Cleveland, and then this happened in the midst. And in March of this year, it was determined by the Justice Department that Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, exerted excessive force with its officers and didn't have the investigation that was due to determine if the officers were at fault in all this. And then this happened.

BALDWIN: All right, let's listen in.

TIM MCGINTY, CUYAHOGA COUNTY, OHIO PROSECUTOR: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Tim McGinty, the Cuyahoga County prosecutor.

Four years ago I retired to run for county prosecutor to make our criminal justice system more transparent, professional and accountable. I believe that greater openness would reduce the errors that cost lives. One promise I made was to fundamentally change how cases are handled when a police officer kills a civilian, to end the traditional system where the prosecutor privately reviewed police reports, then decided if an officer should be charged. That secrecy, which appeared arbitrary, without a public investigative report, undermined community confidence. It was clear we needed a more rigorous, independent investigation of police use of deadly force cases. Although not required by Ohio law, I now have all evidence reviewed, not just by the prosecutor in these cases, or this office, but by the citizens of the grand jury city as an investigative panel, to hear all of the evidence and make the final call. Our office also shares with the public completed independent

investigative reports so that there will be no mystery about what occurred or rumors in a citizen's death. This transparency gives our community an opportunity to correct errors in policy, training, tactics, hiring, equipment, far more quickly instead of waiting sometimes years until the opportunity enthusiasm for reform are lost. The lessons are forgotten. Here, we want the lessons learned and applied. That is why what we have done and we will do in all 20 use of force cases that have come to this office in the past three years.

[14:04:55] Today, a Cuyahoga County grand jury completed its thorough investigation of the fatal shooting of the 12-year-old Tamir Rice on December 22, 2014, at the Codel (ph) Recreation Center. Based on the evidence they heard and the law as it applies to police use of deadly force, the grand jury declined to bring criminal charges against Cleveland Police Officers Timothy Loehmann and Frank Garmback. That was also my recommendation and that of our office after reviewing the investigation and the law.

A short time ago, we informed Tamir's mother of the grand jury's decision. It was a tough conversation. We again expressed the condolences of our office, the sheriff's detectives and everyone else who has worked so diligently on this case and our sincere wish that these events on that traumatic day at the Codel Rec Center had unfolded differently. She was broken up and it's very hard.

We explained to her that this was a difficult decision also but that to charge police, even a situation which was as undeniably tragic as the death of her son, the state must be able to show that the officers acted outside the constitutional boundaries set forth by the Supreme Court of these United States. Simply put, given this perfect storm of human error, mistakes and miscommunications by all involved that day, the evidence did not indicate criminal conduct by police.

On close examination, especially of what is perhaps the most critical piece of evidence, a very recent enhancement of the surveillance video by an expert laboratory often relied upon by the FBI, it is now indisputable that Tamir was drawing his gun from his waist as the police slid toward him and Officer Loehmann exited the car.

At the point where they suddenly came together, both Tamir and the rookie officer were no doubt frightened. If we put ourselves in their victim's shoes, as prosecutors and detectives try to do, it is likely that Tamir, whose size made him look much older and who had been warned that his pellet gun might get him into trouble that day, either intended to hand it over to the officers or show them it wasn't a real gun. But there was no way for the officers to know that because they saw the events rapidly unfolding in front of them from a very different perspective.

Just minutes before the event, assigned and ordered to respond to a code one report of a, quote, "guy," end quote, pointing a gun at people outside the rec center. That guy they had been told was dressed exactly as Tamir was. As they raced that mile towards the rec center from their other assignment, the police were prepared to face an possible active shooter in a neighborhood with a history of violence. There are, in fact, memorials to two slain Cleveland police officers in that very park a short distance away and both had been shot to death nearby in the line of duty.

Police are trained that it only takes a third of a second or less to draw and fire a weapon upon them and therefore they must react quickly to any threat. Officer Loehmann had just seen Tamir put an object into his waist as they pulled up and he stood up in the gazebo and started walking away. A moment later, as the car slid toward him, Tamir drew the replica gun from his waist and the officer fired.

You'll be able to see the - an actual call, 1911 model pistol and an identical replica gun that was used that day. They are very difficult to tell apart, even by people who are very familiar with guns, even when you stand and stare at it.

A moment later, as the car slid toward him, Tamir drew the replica gun from his waist and the officer fired. Believing he was about to be shot was a mistaken yet reasonable belief given the high stress circumstances and his police training. He had reason to fear for his life. It would be unresponsible and unreasonable if the law required a police officer to wait and see if the gun was real.

The outcome will not cheer anyone, nor should it. Every time I think about this case, I cannot help but feel that the victim could have been my own son or grandson. Everyone here who has worked and investigated this case feels the same way. It brings all to sadness. Everyone who investigated this case has children who goes to parks and rec centers. No parent follows their 12-year-old around all day to make sure they don't get into mischief.

[14:09:59] That is why this case taps such profound emotions in all of us. The Rice family has suffered a grievous loss. Nothing will replace Tamir in their lives. The police officers and the police department must live with the awful knowledge that their mistakes, however unintentional, led to the death of a 12-year-old boy. So will the police radio personnel, whose errors were substantial, contributing factors to the tragic outcome. They passed along detailed information about the guy outside the rec center, his clothing, including his colors of his coat and his camouflage hat, but not the all-important facts that the 911 caller said the gunman was probably, quote, "probably a juvenile" and the gun may not be real. Had the officers been aware of these qualifiers, the training officer who was driving might have approached the scene with less urgency, lives not - may not have been put at stake. The fact that the code one high priority call about a possible active shooter next to a rec center was based on inaccurate information is a very significant legal fact, but will do little to ease the emotional burdens that the family and all involved must now carry.

Our entire community has suffered through gut-wrenching self- examinations and recriminations. When an innocent civilian, let alone a child, is killed by a police officer, it touches the nerves that lie close to the surface of all of us in society. That is especially true since the events in place such as Ferguson and Chicago have exposed a gulf of distrust and resentment that too often divides police from the very communities they serve. And when the public is kept in the dark about facts of an investigation into these incidents, that distrust can grow.

All those emotions are compounded when a 12-year-old boy is killed on video. But the original grainy video that had been shown repeatedly on TV is only a small part of the story here. A very important, but small. That is why this case demanded a professional and dispassionate investigation to determine if this was indeed a tragic crime or a tragic accident.

The Supreme Court instructs us to judge an officer's conduct by what he or she knew at the moment, not by what was learned later. We are instructed to ask what a reasonable police officer, with the knowledge he had, would do in this particular situation. The Supreme Court prohibits second guessing police tactics with 20/20 hindsight. And the law gives the benefit of the doubt to the officer who must make split- second decisions when they reasonably believe their lives or those of innocent bystanders are in danger.

Based on these rules, it became clear through this investigation that the actions of Officers Loehmann and Garmback were not criminal and the reasons for this assistant county prosecutor, Matthew Meyer and James Gutierrez (ph) have outlined in a written report that will be available online when you leave here.

In a few moments, I'm going to ask Assistant Prosecutor Meyer to provide the detailed factual legal analysis of this case, the improved evidence that we have discussed already. But now let's deal with it.

The death of Tamir Rice was a tragedy. It was horrible, unfortunate and regrettable, but it was not by the law that binds us, a crime. The - through this process, we too have heard the chants and we too want justice for Tamir. But justice would not be achieved by bringing charges that would violate the ethical (INAUDIBLE) of our profession because we know these charges could not be sustained under the law in our Constitution.

This decision does not mean the legal system is finished with this case. In our country, we have parallel systems of justice. And the civil justice system may yet provide the Rice family with some of the accountability they deserve.

But the grand jury live with this case for more than two months, heard all the witnesses and was there to evaluate each witness's credibility and to question them. In cases where the police used deadly force against its citizens, we now have other citizens review the evidence and make the final call. As a local judge recently said, if you don't trust a grand jury, you don't trust your neighbors. I trust the people of Cuyahoga County to make the final call and that's why I've changed this procedure in this case and every other case of police use of deadly force in this county.

[14:14:54] Now there have been lessons learned already in this case. That is the plus side of this tragic event. And it should never happen again if - and steps have been taken to see it does not. First, the city has bought body cams for all its officers. And that should help greatly. The - we'll know exactly what happened in these situations. Dash cams are on the way for the Cleveland Police Department and the suburban departments, in part using the $1 million this office provided from seized and forfeited moneys from criminals and criminal convictions. The - our goal is to have every car, every police car in Cuyahoga County, including Cleveland and all of the suburbs, with dash cams and officers all wearing body cams. It will improve public confidence and improve performance and protects both the officer and the individual. We'll know exactly what happened in the future. And public confidence rises and complaints fall dramatically. It's been shown across the country.

The second important event that has taken place since this occurred is the consent agreement between the city of Cleveland and the Department of Justice. That will dramatically change the way the city hires, trains and manages its police. I once again applaud Mayor Jackson and council for their leadership on this issue and the Police Chief Williams, who is determined to constantly improve the department, and he has. We have a great chief and a great mayor.

And finally I want to call on the legislature and the manufacturers of toy guns not to make guns that look so much like the real thing. If the color and design of Tamir's pellet gun had screamed toy, then the call that set this tragedy into motion may never have happened.

The grand jury has fully investigated this case and made its final decision. Now it is time for the community and all of us to start to heal. We have taken steps to learn. We're going to continue to learn. We're going to continue to improve the quality of the justice system we have here in this county. But before anyone reaches their own conclusions, and everyone's welcome to their own, we ask please to review the facts and evidence this investigation has uncovered. We have issued the report of the sheriff's department and I thank Sheriff Pinkney (ph) and Detective Morgan (ph) and all the other detectives who worked on this case here and all the hard work they put in. Look at the report. Look at the facts. Look at the - look at the law. That's why we put the reports out as they come in so we're not making decisions based on rumors or hearsay or the like. These are actual facts, and we can learn from these facts.

I call for the leaders of our community to now respect the process and the decision of the grand jury and to urge others to express their opinions in a peaceful and lawful manner. I appreciate the sincere emotion and concern of all citizens who have expressed their feelings on this case, and we thank them. We thank them for caring.

And I will now turn this over to Assistant Prosecutor Matt Meyer, who is the head of the public corruption unit of our Cuyahoga County Prosecutors Office. He's a former chief of the appellate unit. And Mr. Meyer argued successfully a - at the United States Supreme Court this spring in an opinion issued 9-0 this fall in a - what I consider a landmark case, Ohio versus Clark. I thank him. I thank Jim Gutierrez and all the other prosecutors here who have worked on this case and the other UDFs, use of deadly force cases. We - we've had many. Just earlier this month we had two police officers within a three-day period shot in the chest by assailants. Both individuals were killed by other police officers, not the person shot, but these - this is a violent, violent society with all these guns. This is a tough job and I - to investigate these cases and I thank the individuals who actually do the work.

And now we'll hear from Mr. Meyer. Thank you very much for your attention.

BALDWIN: All right, so, Tim McGinty, he is the prosecutor there in Cuyahoga County. And the news is the fact that the grand jury there in the Cleveland area have revealed upon investigating since October of this year that they will not bring criminal charges against the two police officers involved in the death - the shooting death of 12-year- old Tamir Rice from November of 2014.

Just a couple of notes before I bring Jean and Joey back in. The prosecutor did say he had a conversation with Tamir Rice's mother. To use his words, it was a tough conversation. She was broken up and it was very hard. Obviously she was hoping, from everything we've heard from her, that there would be probable cause to indict those officers.

[14:20:07] And apparently Tamir Rice was warned that day that his pellet gun might get him into trouble. Pointed out Tamir's size, that he is - was bigger. That even though that it was not relayed from dispatch to the officers who responded on the scene that the caller did indicate potentially a juvenile, potentially a pellet gun being used, that was not relayed.

And so with that, Jean and Joey, let me just bring you back in because there's a lot to go through. Number one, the fact that we now know that criminal charges will not be brought, what do they have to go through, this process with this grand jury, to arrive at that decision?

JACKSON: What happens is the grand jury's empaneled. Then it's up to the district attorney to present whatever information they think is relevant or appropriate for that grand jury to determine. Again, the district attorney controls the grand jury, the flow of information, what they hear, what they may not hear and, of course, what charges ultimately they could or should not consider.

BALDWIN: Right.

JACKSON: And that, of course, calls into question, and the community I think is going to be very concerned, about the independence of the process. I think you're hearing not only in this community but throughout the country that there potentially needs to be some separate and apart -

BALDWIN: Recusal or an objective - yes.

JACKSON: Exactly. When you have a local prosecutor who works with officers, who relies upon officers for investigations, for arrests, to make the community safe, it's very difficult for that particular district attorney now to prosecute those officers.

BALDWIN: Yes.

JACKSON: So if there is some independent process, I think it just breathes more trust into the process itself. Now, the grand jury has convened. The grand jury has concluded that

there won't be any charges. And now we turn to the civil process, which really determines whether there was negligence. But before getting to that, I think there are going to be two very overriding questions here in addition to the process.

Number one, remember that the argument always has been that the officer, that is Loehmann and Garmback, who was driving, they created the condition. So to what extent, if you create the dangerous condition by rolling up upon a scene and a situation, are you now entitled to, as, you know, as was said by the attorneys representing the Tamir Rice family, shoot your way out of it. That's one situation. The second big issue is, should Loehmann have been on the force to begin with. We know he was discharged for incompetence from the law enforcement place of Independence, Ohio, before he got to this particular area.

BALDWIN: There is so much more I want to get to -

JACKSON: Yes.

BALDWIN: Including the fact that we know that the officers did not testify in front of the grand jury. There were statements that were given. So I want to make sure we hear the officers side of things. And also more from what we've heard. Tamir's family, Tamir Rice's family, how the community could potentially respond to the fact again, as we've heard from the Cuyahoga County prosecutor, that those two officers involved in the shooting death of 12-year-old Tamir Rice two Novembers ago will not be criminally charged. More on that breaking news in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:26:09] MATT MEYER, SUPERVISOR, CUYAHOGA CO. PUBLIC CORRUPTION UNIT: Local Walmart and you'll see that as purchased this airsoft pistol should have had that orange safety tip to hopefully alert officers that this, in fact, was a toy. But the pistol that Tamir had that day had no such tip.

BALDWIN: All right, so they are showing what, you know, this pellet gun would have looked like obviously had it had that orange tip to let the officers know that it was not the real thing. Again, if you're just joining us, we've gotten the breaking news out of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, basically the Cleveland area of Ohio, the fact that these two police officers involved in the shooting death of 12-year- old Tamir Rice from November 22, 2014, they will not be criminally charged based upon the findings of this grand jury there. So back with me I have CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson and Jean Casarez, who's been all over this. Also I should mention we now have Sunny Hostin who's on the phone with us as well.

And, Sunny, I'll get to you and your reaction in a moment. But I think also key, Jean, is when we heard from Tim McGinty, the prosecutor, saying the most critical piece of evidence, the recent enhancement of the video, his word, indisputable that Tamir Rice was drawing a gun from his waist as the police officer slid towards him and Officer Loehmann got out of the car.

CASAREZ: So -

BALDWIN: That was the evidence he says.

CASAREZ: So it looks like this case may have turned on very fine details right there because, you know, what was the grand jury presented, right, because you talk about a complete case. Well, here's one piece of evidence. It looks like recently enhanced video. We don't know who enhanced it. Normally the FBI does things like that. But that right there - and I hope we get to see it because that determines the state of mind of the officer. And if, in fact, the gun was coming out and was being pointed, then you have to look at the state of mind that he mistakenly, but reasonably believed, that it was a real gun and life could be in danger.

BALDWIN: Here is - I think this is also important to point out in this conversation because the officers did not actually testify in front of the grand jury, but they - they gave statements, which I know infuriated the family. But just to hear from the officers, this is from Officer Timothy Loehmann saying that he saw the suspect, Rice, quote, "pick up an object and stick it down into his waistband upon arriving at the scene." The officer says he was yelling, "show me your hands" as loudly as he could. The suspect, quoting the officer, "the suspect lifted his shirt, reached down into his waistband. We continued to yell, show me your hands. I was focused on the suspect. Even when he was reaching into his waistband, I didn't fire. With his hands pulling the gun out and his elbow coming up, I knew it was a gun and it was coming out. I saw the weapon in his hands coming out of his waistband and the threat to my partner and myself was real and active. I shot towards the gun in his hands."

With that, Sunny Hostin, you're on the line.

SUNNY HOSTIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST (via telephone): Hi, Brooke.

I mean I - you know, I think that having covered this case for quite some time and I've also interviewed Tamir Rice's mother, I think people are going to really have a problem with the process here. I think this is a case, quite frankly, that screamed out for a special prosecutor and that wasn't the case here. And I think when, you know, Prosecutor McGinty said during this press conference that his recommendation was also not to charge the officers, that is very problematic because we know that the grand jury is really directed, it's run by the prosecutor's office. So if you have a prosecutor that goes into the process after a two-year investigation believing that charges were inappropriate, I would question what kind of material was presented to the grand jury.

I mean even though, you know, this video may have been enhanced, it is very clear the timing of this incident. We're talking about from exiting the car to shooting or from arriving on the scene mere seconds.

[14:30:08] BALDWIN: Seconds.

HOSTIN: If my recollection - hello?

BALDWIN: No, I was - I was - spoke right when you did. Seconds.