Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James weighed in on the Tamir Rice case for the first time on Tuesday, following a social media campaign urging him to sit out games in protest following a grand jury’s decision not to indict two Cleveland police officers who shot and killed the 12-year-old last year, after mistaking his pellet gun for a deadly weapon.
James, who has shown solidarity with the victims of gun violence in the past, said he hadn’t spoken out on the Rice case previously because he didn’t feel informed enough to do so.
“For me, I’ve always been a guy who’s took pride in knowledge of every situation that I’ve ever spoke on,” James said after a winning game against the Denver Nuggets, according to ESPN. “And to be honest, I haven’t really been on top of this issue. So it’s hard for me to comment. I understand that any lives that [are] lost, what we want more than anything is prayer and the best for the family, for anyone. But for me to comment on the situation, I don’t have enough knowledge about it.”
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Earlier on Tuesday, a #NoJusticeNoLeBron hashtag began to pick up steam on social media. Spearheaded by Baltimore-based activist Tariq Touré, the campaign called on James to sit out upcoming Cavaliers games to put pressure on the Department of Justice to “imprison the murderers of Tamir Rice.” On Monday, a grand jury chose not to indict, believing the officers had a “reasonable” fear for the loss of their lives, in a case that prosecutors called a “perfect storm” of human error.
The #NoJusticeNoLeBron concept has inspired impassioned support, as well as some backlash, but James said he hadn’t been following the fallout on Tuesday, because he is “not much of a social media guy.”
“I caught a little bit of it from my folks on the side saying that you guys might ask me about it, but I have no knowledge,” James said.








