Samaria Rice Explains Why She Refuses To Endorse A Presidential Candidate

Samaria Rice Explains Why She Refuses To Endorse A Presidential Candidate

Samaria Rice refuses to endorse a presidential candidate.

Rice, whose 12-year-old son Tamir Rice was gunned down by a Cleveland police officer, explained in a post on Medium that the candidates’ proposals are coming up short.

She writes:

“Instead of plans for justice and accountability, I have been shown several plans for criminal justice reform, none that address my experience of the entire system being guilty. Those plans don’t address the many ways elected officials become exempt to accountability and the legal flaws that allow them to extend that exemption to cops who kill.”

In November 2014, Tamir was playing with a pellet gun at a Cleveland recreational center when Officer Timothy Loehmann fatally shot him. A video captured the moment when Loehmann and his partner Frank Garmback, responding to a 911 call, pulled up to Rice in their patrol car; Loehmann then shot the boy within seconds. They reportedly were not aware that a witness said the gun was probably a toy and Rice looked like a juvenile.

Following the tragedy, Rice said the “severe trauma” compounded. The county prosecutor, Timothy McGinty, “blamed my 12-year-old boy for his own death” and backed the officers. Consequently, a grand jury declined to indict them.

Rice said she’s been fighting for justice since the shooting…She stated:

“For over a year, I’ve waited to see if any candidate or official, including my state’s governor (GOP presidential candidate John Kasich) would release a plan of action that addressed the failures and inhumane decisions responsible for my son’s death.”

Rice said real solutions require community involvement…She wrote:

“My experience has let me know that the system is working just the way the people in power want it to. That is why I refuse to accept plans or support politicians that offer what they propose as solutions, not informed by us, the community.”

While she supports other mothers whose children have died at the hands of the police, Rice said she cannot put her faith in a candidate as they have done.