has been identified. and police have not made any arrests in the shootings. the u.s. city of cleveland is set to move forward on agreed changes to its police department. a reform plan was created after a 2014 justice department report found patterns of force and civil rights violations by cleveland police. the next step comes while the city is dealing with unrest after the acquittal of a police office. officer accused of klg two unarmed african-americans. brian todd reports. reporter: a cleveland judge aquits police officer michael brelow, and touches off a round of protests where 71 people are arrested. and sparks concerns over what may happen next. my concern is there is a spike in violence, that there is a, a group that, that
steals the discussion. and it, it bend into violence and not a civil discussion about effective and proper engagement between the police and the community. reporter: found not guilty in the 2012 deaths of timothy russell and melissa williams, two unarmed african-americans. about a dozen police officers fired 137 shots into their vehicle in about 8 second. authorities said brelow himself stood on the hood of the car and blasted 15 shots through the windshield. nuven none of the other officers were charged with manslaughter. causation was not proved for both counts. the judge acquitted brelow after a 22-mile car chase prompted by the couple speeding away. brelow and officer had reason to believe they were at risk that even after all the shots the police couldn t be sure the threat was over. and that it couldn t be proven brelow s shots worth one that killed russell and williams.
reasonable excuse for those crimes. reporter: with those words a cleveland judge acquits police officer michael brelow touches off a round of protests where 71 people are arrested. and sparks concerns over what may happen next. my concern is there is a spike in violence. that there is a group that steals the discussion and it bends into violence and not a civil discussion about proper engagement between the police and community. reporter: he was found not guilty in the deaths of timothy russell and melissa williams, two unarmed african-americans. about a dozen police officers fired 137 shots into their vehicle in about eight seconds. authorities said bris low himself stood on the hood of the car and blasted 15 shots through the windshield. none of the other officers were even charged with manslaughter. the element of causation was
not proved for both counts. reporter: the judge said he acquitted bre are llow because after a car chase he and the other officers had reason to believe they were at risk, even after all the shots police couldn t be sure the threat was over and that it couldn t be proven his shots were the ones that killed russell and williams. cleveland can t exhale just yet. a case of tamir rice was shot and killed by cleveland police in november while holding a pellet gun. the investigation is almost finish eded in the rice case. and protest leaders are looking for accountability. america is already experiencing unrest because police are killing us. reporter: the justice department found they used unnecessary and unreasonable force at a significant rate.
how we feel about it is inconsequential. the judge laid out how he viewed everything that happened during that day. just because a gun wasn t found when this was concluded, this went on for 100-mile-an-hour chase through the city. they could have toss the guns out the window. it doesn t mean that there weren t shots fired. later they determined it was a backfire. they re getting. you ve you had a noise that sounded like gunfire as the car was driving down the street. other witnesses confirm that there was the sound of gunfire. when they find no guns they think must have been a backfire. cedric i want to ask you about baltimore because over the weekend 28 shootings, seven deaths. what do you make of these numbers? these are so high.