UNITED STATES: “I Was So Scared”: 4 Cops Fired After Shooting 2 Unarmed Black Brothers — One Was Killed
Four California officers said they saw a Black man with a gun and heard shots before opening fire on two brothers in a car. They wounded one brother and killed the other.
Neither brother was armed.
The 2023 shooting happened in Martinez after police responded to a burglary alarm at a marijuana dispensary on Aug. 18. Tahmon and Tommy Wilson tried to drive away, and officers fired into the vehicle as it left, according to attorney Adanté Pointer. Tahmon was shot in the back of the head. Tommy was shot in the back and died.
In interviews with the California DOJ, officers gave a different story.
“I discharged my service pistol at the passenger who I’d seen with the gun and who I now heard a gunshot come from the vehicle,” Officer Cole Bennett said
“I bring my pistol up, and I’m aiming at the driver’s side. And then, I hear gunshots,” Officer Alexander Tirona told investigators. “I immediately fire a quick volley of six rounds.”
Officer Marc Kahue said: “I just remember seeing a gun… It was almost like a blur of me trying to process everything and then seeing the gun.
Officer Raul Ceja-Mendez said:
“When I looked at the front — in the windshield, and I seen the passenger with a black semi-automatic firearm… I was so scared. The only thing I could think about was that I was not going to make it home that night.”
But no gun was found in the brothers’ car. No charges were filed against Tahmon because, his attorney said, no crime was committed.
Three Martinez officers have now been fired for “misconduct,” according to Police Chief Andrew White — not for the shooting itself.
Officer Giani Arone was fired for kneeling on the handcuffed, wounded Tommy multiple times while he was moaning in pain, and for taunting him: “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.”
Bennett and Tirona were fired for conspiring to hide an illegal knife that Bennett had. Bennett’s body camera was the only one that captured the shooting, but it had no audio.
“It is disappointing that misconduct occurred at the scene of this incident after the shooting and understandably adds a layer of complexity to the officer-involved shooting investigation,” Chief White said. “Once we learned of the misconduct, we took immediate action.”
Pointer called it “street justice.”
“Officers shot into the car as the car was driving away from the police officers and was not posing a danger to anyone,” he told ABC 7.
“There is no reasonable or lawful explanation for the lethal force employed by the four officers involved,” he told KRON 4. “State law prohibits using deadly force against a fleeing vehicle that does not pose an immediate threat.”
The California DOJ investigation is still active. The department says it will do another probe into excessive force once that’s done.