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Video footage shows the shocking moment a 13-year-old San Antonio boy was fatally shot by police, just days after a grand jury declined to charge the officer – who killed a man just a year earlier and was accused of being a ‘trigger-happy hot head’ – who fired the gun.
Police have claimed throughout that the boy – Andre ‘AJ’ Hernandez – was driving a stolen Toyota Corolla at the time and threw the stolen car in reverse and struck the cops, putting their lives in danger, after they approached on June 3.
Hernandez’s family claims that there was no way the car could’ve been going fast enough, nor would the officers have been unable to tell that there were only kids in the car.
Officer Stephen Ramos, who was responding with a partner to reports of gunfire involving the red vehicle, then fired once, wounding Hernandez in the abdomen, while he was riding with two other boys and died after being transported to the hospital.
The footage shows Ramos’ partner – who was only identified as ‘Espinoza’ – having to pull his leg back in the vehicle before Hernandez rammed into them. San Antonio police have claimed Hernandez put Espinoza’s life in danger.
Video footage shows the shocking moment a 13-year-old San Antonio boy was fatally shot by police, just days after a grand jury declined to charge the officer – who killed a man just a year earlier and was accused of being a ‘trigger-happy hot head’ – who fired the gun
Police have claimed throughout that the boy – Andre ‘AJ’ Hernandez (pictured) – was driving a stolen Toyota Corolla at the time and threw the stolen car in reverse and struck the cops, putting their lives in danger, after they approached on June 3
Officer Stephen Ramos, who was responding with a partner to reports of gunfire involving the red vehicle, then fired once, wounding Hernandez in the abdomen, while he was riding with two other boys and died after being transported to the hospital
The officers, along with a third who was only identified as ‘Officer Claire,’ were called to the scene at 1:18 a.m. the morning of June 3.
The shooting happens within the next 10 minutes. They approach the scene at 1:21 a.m. on War Cloud Street.
At 1:22 a.m., Espinoza starts to leave the driver’s side of the vehicle, as Ramos warns Espinoza: ‘Don’t let him ram you!’
Espinoza opens the driver’s side door, puts his left leg outside the doorstop and shouts at the kids: ‘Let me see your hands!’
He then pulls his left leg back into the car as the door slams shut and the Corolla driven by Hernandez hits the police vehicle.
Ramos wrote in a report that: ‘At this time, I believed the driver of the vehicle was using his vehicle as a deadly weapon to attempt to kill Officer Espinoza. I fired one shot at the driver of the vehicle to stop the threat to Officer Espinoza.’
Seconds later, Ramos gets out of the passenger side, takes out his weapon and fires a round, notifying dispatch.
Hernandez steps out of the car, says ‘I’m shot, sir’ and falls to the ground. He was eventually taken to a hospital and pronounced dead.
Hernandez’s mother had reported him missing as he frequently ran out weeks after the shooting death of his sister
The red Toyota Corolla is seen here, ramming into a police vehicle
Hernandez was driving in the car with two other teenagers
One of Hernandez’s passengers then begs Ramos to call Hernandez’s family: ‘Grab my phone! May you please grab my phone, sir. Please call his family! Sir!’
A statement from Bexar County District Attorney Joe Gonzales’ office said: ‘It was reasonable for Officer Ramos to believe that Officer Espinoza was standing outside of his vehicle and was therefore being threatened with deadly force by the red Toyota as it accelerated towards him.’
The DA’s office added that Ramos then fired in order to protect Espinoza from ‘unjustified harm.’
The county’s report is based off of statements as well as dashboard cameras from the car Ramos and Espinoza were using as well as Espinoza’s body camera. Ramos’ body camera was not used and the county did not explain why.
However, Hernandez’s family and attorney Lee Merritt have argued that the car was never moving fast enough to truly harm Espinoza.
They also claim that anyone could have seen that the car they’d stolen was full of Hernandez and two other children, according to the San Antonio Express News.
‘We’re talking about a 13-year-old boy who was killed by police,’ his mother, Lynda Espinoza – no apparent relation to the unidentified officer – said in a protest just after the shooting.
The boy’s family had just three weeks prior lost AJ’s 16-year-old sister Naveah Martinez, after she was shot dead just blocks away from the family’s home, according to Oxygen.
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Lynda Espinoza, mother of 13-year-old Andre ‘AJ’ Hernandez
Friends and family members of 13-year-old Andre Hernandez hold signs outside Millers Pond Park as they try to attract motorists to a food plate sale to raise money for Hernandezs funeral on June 11, 2022
In March of 2021, Ramos responded to reports of a man – 57-year-old John Pena Montez (pictured) – with a knife breaking into a home and threatening to kill himself in an argument with his common-law wife. Police allege Montez lunged at officers and waved a knife at them, but his family disputes this
Hernandez’s mother said that he had become so grief stricken that he’d left the home.
‘I just put him as a runaway because he didn’t want to come with me, didn’t want to listen,’ Lynda Espinoza said. ‘So, I did what a mother was supposed to do.’
Even back then, the family wanted people to see her son’s humanity despite what had occurred.
‘He was a 13-year-old little boy grieving the loss of his sister, and they were really close,’ AJ’s aunt Stephanie Martinez said. ‘He was still a baby and hadn’t even really started his life.’
‘I want people to know don’t always believe what you hear and read, wait for the facts to come out … wait for the truth to come out before you judge my nephew. Hopefully, once you hear the truth, you guys will be able to support us and support the family to get justice for my nephew.’
‘Our system of justice is based on citizen input, yet nothing can repair the pain and loss that AJ Hernandez’s family has endured. A young boy was tragically lost on that day and we know that no mother should ever have to bury their child,’ said Criminal District Attorney Gonzales in a statement.
This is also not the first time Officer Stephen Ramos has been involved in a fatal shooting.
In March of 2021, Ramos responded to reports of a man – 57-year-old John Pena Montez – with a knife breaking into a home and threatening to kill himself in an argument with his common-law wife.
Ramos’ partner failed to subdue Montez using a stun gun twice. A police report then says Montez ‘lunged’ and swung a knife at the officers, though family members dispute this.
‘He was a 13-year-old little boy grieving the loss of his sister, and they were really close,’ AJ’s aunt Stephanie Martinez said. ‘He was still a baby and hadn’t even really started his life.’
A memorial set up at the grave of 13-year-old Andre Hernandez Jr
A memorial shared between AJ and his sister, Nevaeh, who had been killed in a shooting three weeks earlier
The officer then fired at Montez, killing him. But Debra Montez Felder, Montez’s sister, completely disputes this account after watching body camera footage.
‘As soon as I saw it, I told them this was unjustified and unwarranted,’ she said. ‘He was just standing there at the door. There was no reason for you to shoot him.’
Felder says that Ramos has a reputation for firing his gun when it’s not necessarily needed.
‘SAPD and the DA’s office were on notice that this guy was a hothead, trigger-happy,’ she told NBC News. ‘You were aware of it even before the killing of this 13-year-old kid.’
She also said that her brother was a veteran who was going through a ‘mental health crisis’ at the time. His wife called the police and a local hospital out of fear he would hurt himself.
Felder said that the shooting of Hernandez enraged her even further and has pushed her campaign to have the body camera footage released publicly.
‘I’m angry because this kid didn’t deserve that,’ she said. ‘SAPD knew this guy emotionally can’t control himself, he cannot control himself, and it’s just unreal.’
A month after Hernandez was shot, a grand jury also refused to charge Ramos in the shooting of Montez.
Ramos had been placed on administrative leave after the March 2021 shooting but had returned to full duty by September after an Internal Affairs investigation. The footage from that shooting remains unreleased.
It is unclear what Ramos’ current status is with the department. The announcement by the district attorney’s office also says that grand jury’s decision concludes the investigation into the shooting.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Dailymail.co.uk
