The Akron police officer who killed Jazmir Tucker on Thanksgiving night shot the 15-year-old in the back twice, Summit County Medical Examiner Lisa Kohler announced Wednesday morning. Tucker was also shot in the right arm.
Both of Officer Davon Fields’ gunshots to Tucker’s back — one piercing his heart and left lung before exiting his body and another piercing his pelvis, small intestine and other organs — would have killed Tucker rapidly, Kohler said. The gunshot wound to his right arm would not have been fatal, the autopsy said. It said the shot to his arm had “irregular” entrance and exit wounds and it was unclear what direction the shot was fired from. The bullet that struck Tucker’s pelvis, small intestine and other organs was recovered from his body.
“The tragic death of Jazmir Tucker was made even more difficult for his family today with the revelation that he was struck in the back by two bullets from an officer with the Akron Police Dept.,” attorneys for Tucker’s family said in a statement following the autopsy’s release.
“Jazmir’s family is devastated knowing that it now appears he wasn’t even looking in the officer’s direction when he was shot and killed.”
Summit County’s autopsy of the teenager, which was conducted Nov. 29 and finalized Tuesday, provides more clues about the killing than were revealed when portions of Fields’ and his colleagues’ body-worn camera videos were released last month.
Fields did not turn his camera on prior to shooting Tucker. His camera was activated when the lights of another police cruiser were turned on, which didn’t happen soon enough to meaningfully document what led up to the shooting. The officer’s assault-style weapon also frequently blocked the camera’s view and Fields was too far away from the teenager for his camera to consistently show what Tucker was doing.
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While the autopsy reveals that Tucker was shot in the back twice and arm once, it does not say which of the three shots came first, the position that Tucker was in when he was shot, or whether he was running away.
In a landmark 1985 U.S. Supreme Court case, justices ruled that a police officer can use deadly force on a fleeing person suspected of a violent felony if they believe the person poses a significant threat of death or serious injury to officers or others. Police claim Tucker had been firing shots nearby and a gun was later found zipped away in his jacket pocket; the medical examiner did not test Tucker’s hands for gunshot residue, citing the unreliability of the practice, and could not say if he shot a weapon.
Fields and other officers waited at least seven minutes to approach the teenager after he was shot while they repeatedly shouted orders at him to put his arms out. Officers waited even longer to attempt to provide aid to the teenager.
While Tucker was officially pronounced dead at Akron General Medical Center nearly a half hour after the shooting, Kohler said on Tuesday that the gunshot that pierced his heart would have been quickly lethal, describing it as “rapid” and “devastating.” The initial statement from the APD claimed that Tucker “succumbed to his injuries” only after arriving at the hospital.
Fields was placed on paid administrative leave after the shooting while the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation investigates it, as is the standard procedure for the APD. Records obtained by Signal Akron detail that Fields attended SWAT training four days after killing Tucker.
In a statement released Wednesday morning, Akron Mayor Shammas Malik thanked the county’s medical examiner’s office for their work and said the autopsy would be included in the Ohio BCI investigation, which would then be presented to a grand jury to weigh whether Fields will face criminal indictment.
“As this process continues, and particularly on this day, I want to again express my heartfelt sympathies to the family and loved ones of Jazmir Tucker,” Malik said. The APD declined to comment on the autopsy.
Deante Lavender, lead pastor of the Remedy Church, where Tucker’s funeral was held, said the fact that the teenager was shot in the back “is the most important information.”
“There’s always an undertone of aggression when a Black man, in this particular case, a Black child, is shot, as if ‘We had to do it,’” Lavender said. “How was it an act of aggression when his back was turned to you?”
Lavender said he plans to reach out to the mayor, police chief and other officials with his concerns, including questions of what policies will change.
Judi Hill, president of the Akron NAACP, said in a text message she was in tears following the release of the autopsy. The results show that Tucker did not pose a threat and the autopsy results will re-traumatize Tucker’s family and the community, she said.
Hill called for a U.S. Department of Justice “pattern-or-practice” investigation into the APD and for an “outside team” to “investigate policing that will guarantee items to create change.”
“We don’t have time for more discussion,” she concluded. “We can’t afford to lose more Jazmir Tuckers.”
Freedom BLOC, an organization that that promotes Black political power, also called for a federal investigation into APD and for “sweeping reforms” in the department. The group called for Fields to be fired immediately.
“This was an execution of a Black child who was walking away,” Freedom BLOC Executive Director Ray Greene Jr said in a statement. “Officer Fields’s actions are nothing short of a gross abuse of power, and his failure to render immediate aid to Jazmir after inflicting fatal wounds demonstrates a chilling disregard for human life.”
Tucker’s killing, the statement said, is “not an isolated incident but part of a pattern of systemic racism and unchecked violence in policing that disproportionately affects Black and Brown communities.”
Editor’s note: This story will be updated.
