However, multiple investigations found, the dispatcher failed to inform the responding officers that the caller said Tamir was "probably" a child and the gun was "probably fake".
Video from a nearby camera showed Garmback driving his cruiser up to where the boy was playing near a gazebo, and Loehmann leaping from the passenger seat. Seconds later, Tamir had been shot and was dying in the snow. The boy's weapon turned out to be a pellet gun.
The shooting - one in a series of high profile police killings of black men, women and children in late 2014 and early 2015 - prompted US outrage and nights of protest in Cleveland, but ultimately prosecutors declined to press charges against Loehmann. An internal affairs investigation would later conclude that he did not violate any department policies when he shot and killed Tamir.
But a separate investigation concluded that Loehmann had lied when he applied to work for the Cleveland Division of Police, which is the infraction that led to his firing.
In a statement, the Rice family said the announcement that Loehmann would be fired for lying but not for killing Tamir "only added insult to the pain and grief".
"I am relieved Loehmann has been fired because he should never have been a police officer in the first place-but he should have been fired for shooting my son in less than one second, not just for lying on his application." Samaria Rice, Tamir's mother, said in a statement."And Garmback should be fired too, for his role in pulling up too close to Tamir,"
The announcement brings to end a more-than-two-year process that included investigations by Cleveland police, the local sheriff's office, the county prosecutor, as well as a special Critical Incident Review Committee - which aimed to determine if any administrative violations had taken place.