On the evening of August 5, 2014, 22-year-old John Crawford III was shot and killed by police officers at a Walmart store in Beavercreek, Ohio. The police were responding to a 911 call made by Ronald Ritchie, a customer in the Walmart store at the same time as Crawford. Ritchie had indicated to police that Crawford was posing an immediate threat to multiple lives and property by loading a rifle and subsequently pointing it threateningly at shoppers, some of whom were children.

In the aftermath of the shooting, Ritchie would eventually alter his original report to 911 and clarify to media that at no time did Crawford threaten the shoppers in the store as he previously alleged to police. Further, undisputable video surveillance showed that Crawford never even loaded the rifle (which turned out to be a toy) as Ritchie had claimed. These deliberately falsified allegations directly informed the actions of the police who used lethal force against Crawford with fatal consequences.

A grand jury has since acquitted the police of any wrong-doing in the shooting death of Crawford, but it is unthinkable that no criminal charges have yet been brought against Ritchie for his admitted false claims to police. The Ohio Revised Code 2917.32 contains very unambiguous language on filing false police reports and making false alarms of an impending catastrophe when the reporter of such an alarm knows that all or part of his information is false and knows, or should know, that such claims will cause inconvenience and/or harm.

An innocent man is dead at the hands of false information communicated to police. We the people do not wish to live in a society where its citizens may, with impunity, pass deliberately-falsified information to police when it could be expected to lead to disastrous consequences.

Please, sign this petition and help send a message of justice.

A sister petition (see link below) also exists to call on the Department of Justice to investigate Ritchie for civil rights violations.

 http://wh.gov/i1v9R