POOR TIMING

Baltimore Cop Shoots Boy with BB Gun

On anniversary of riots over Freddie Gray’s death.

Baltimore police said an officer shot a 13-year-old boy on Wednesday who he believed was carrying a semiautomatic pistol, but was in fact a BB gun. Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said the boy suffered non-life-threatening injuries. The weapon was identified as a spring-air-powered BB gun, which is not a real gun. Davis said two plainclothes detectives got out of their car, identified themselves as police and told the teen to stop. The boy, who was not identified, began running for about 150 yards before one of the detectives fired his weapon at the youth. Davis added the weapon was an “absolute, identical replica semiautomatic pistol. Those police officers had no way of knowing that it was not, in fact, an actual firearm. It looks like a firearm.” The incident comes on the same day officials marked the one-year anniversary of the riots over the death of Freddie Gray, who died after suffering a spinal cord injury in police custody. Six officers have been charged in Gray’s arrest and death.