COLUMBUS — Funeral services have been set for a 13-year-old boy fatally shot by a Columbus police officer investigating a report of armed robbery.
Attorneys for the family of Tyre King say the funeral will be held Saturday morning at the First Church of God on Refugee Road. The 10:00 a.m. services are open to the public.
In announcing Tyre’s funeral, his family said it “stands in solidarity” with others recently killed by police in North Carolina, Oklahoma and elsewhere.
They want an independent investigation into the incident and Congresswoman Joyce Beatty (D-Columbus) sympathizes. She thinks it is the best way to achieve results that everyone believes are unbiased.
Beatty says she and other members of the Congressional Black Caucus were planning to deliver a letter to U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch calling for a Justice Department investigation in to the shootings.
“This has to stop,” she said. “We need to have federal investigators come in. We have to resolve this. It’s not good for Ohio, it’s not good for the nation.”
She says the problem of growing mutual distrust between police and minority communities will not be solved by neighborhood meetings and dialogues alone. “Been there, done that,” was her assessment.
She also doesn’t think much of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s recommendation for a stop-and-frisk law.
“At this time and place, it could be one of the worst things we could have,” she said.
Trump claimed the program was a success in New York, though it has been widely discredited, and later his campaign claimed his comment was aimed only at the problem of violence in African-American neighborhoods in Chicago.
Columbus police say Officer Bryan Mason shot Tyre on Sept. 14 after the boy ran from investigators and pulled a BB gun that looked like a real firearm (above).
Evidence in the shooting investigation will automatically be presented to a grand jury to determine if the officer’s actions were justified or charges are warranted.