#Ferguson

~ Laura

At 9:00 last night, Prosecutor Robert P. McCulloch gave a twenty minute explanation of events that led to Michael Brown’s death last August before finally saying that the Grand Jury found that there not enough evidence to bring this case to trial.

Lots of very reasonable people believe that this was a clear cut case of police brutality against people of color. I’m not sure. Mostly because I don’t know all the evidence. I wish this case had gone to court, because I think that there was sufficient evidence to merit a trial and a public trial would have given people the information that they needed.

I think the courts turned this Grand Jury into a full trial, but one that was protected by rules of privacy. The privacy was probably to protect Office Wilson and the African-American witnesses who confirmed his story. I appreciate the concern for those individuals, but the secrecy of those proceedings have created other problems.

Was this a case of a split second bad decision? Cops have to make split second decisions all the time. Sometimes people choose badly in those cases. Split second bad decisions aren’t necessary criminal, except if you can show that the bad decision was the result of historical personal and institutional bigotry. Was there evidence of historical personal and institutional bigotry? I don’t know.

Wilson shot the Brown twelve times. That’s a lot of bullets. A split second wrong decision means one or two bullets. Why all the bullets? I needed more information on this.

If this case had gone to trial, other issues would have become part of the debate. Cops have a wider legal latitude for self-protection than the general public. They can use lethal force if they believe that they are under imminent threat. Is that too much discretion? A trial would have brought up that discussion.

I’m just rambling here… Open thread..

Published by Laura

24 thoughts on “#Ferguson”

  1. I have heard from several attorneys that this was the cowards/lazy way to deal with this case. It should’ve gone to trial, simply because there was so much conflicting evidence. It needed a judge and transparency.

    I’m also curious why the verdict was announced at 9:00 pm. It seemed to stoke the fire. There is a part of me that thinks that that they were hoping for a riot to justify police brutality.

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  2. agreed. My guess is that they turned a grand jury into a regular trial in order to protect the officer and the witnesses. He is supposed to resign from the force later this week. I wonder if that was part of the bargain.

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  5. I agree that the prosecutor, Robert McCulloch, seems unaware of the difference between an indictment to bring a case to trial and the actual trial itself.

    McCulloch said, ”The duty of the grand jury is to separate fact from fiction.”

    No, that’s NOT the duty of a grand jury. A grand jury is supposed to determine if there is probable cause for a trial.

    The jury at the trial is supposed to determine fact from fiction. That’s the whole point of the trial!

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      2. Exactly. Chaos and destruction of property are out there being sold as a greater sin than taking someone’s life unjustifiably. McCulloch is shrewd and smart.

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  7. Many people, myself included, would consider it unethical for the prosecutor to proceed to trial if he didn’t think there was a case. In that situation, taking the matter to a grand jury might be the only course both honorable and politically feasible.

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    1. Charles Pierce was writing at Esquire weeks ago that the way that the prosecutor was presenting the case to the grand jury was a) not standard practice and b) pretty much guaranteed to ensure that they did not indict the police officer.

      This was a stitch-up from the word Go.

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      2. Wow, the punditocracy seems to have become crim pro experts with amazing speed. I strongly recommend not getting your legal knowledge from sources like Charles Pierce.

        There are so many lawyers with top credentials blogging, why would someone read a political columnist for Esquire?

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      3. I’ve never read Charles Pierce in my life. I only read Esquire for the dirty pictures. Still, it was a very obvious fix-up.

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  8. FYI, transcripts of all testimony and evidence seen by the grand jury have been made public, an unusual move meant to increase the transparency in this difficult case. Easily searchable online.

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  9. Wilson shot Brown twelve times. That’s a lot of bullets. A split second wrong decision means one or two bullets. Why all the bullets? I needed more information on this.

    I can’t say anything about the specific case, but with this types of guns that police carry these days, shooting 12 bullets (the full magazine, most likely) isn’t very hard, and can be done very quickly, especially if you are very excited, as someone involved in a shooting is likely to be.

    Maybe 17-18 years ago, my father, who is now retired, was involved in a fatal shooting while working as a police officer. A guy was pulled over by another officer, and my father came as back-up. The guy got out of the car (as asked, I think), but wouldn’t turn around, and had his hands were they couldn’t be seen. He proceeded to pull out a gun, and shoot the first officer over his shoulder (non-fatally, but seriously.) He shot 6-7 more times, and my father shoot 9-10 times, killing him. (My father had a bullet hole through his jacket and a cut on the bottom of his foot where a bullet went through his boot, but was otherwise unhurt.) From the time the guy got out of the car until he was dead was less than two minutes, though my father said it seemed like an hour. I don’t have an informed opinion in this case, and can easily believe it was a “bad” shoot, but that a lot of shots were fired in a very short time doesn’t necessarily indicate that.

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  10. Can we talk about this subject without losing our minds? Should I do another post on this? I’m not interested in mediating an irrational comment section, but I always love a healthy debate.

    On a side note, a friend of mine teaches at a NYC community college. She was very disappointed because so many of her students had no idea what happened in Ferguson, especially since she teaches a diverse student body.

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  11. I was just talking with my mom about how it’s probably a good thing we won’t be in NY for Thanksgiving this year, because it’s probably not a good idea for my former NYPD BIL and me to be in the same room so soon after Ferguson.

    I was reading an essay by a woman who is the wife of a police officer and the mother of a black son, so she feels both sides of the issue. The part that resonated for me was when she said she tells her husband to do what he has to do to come home to her every night. My sister always felt the same way.

    But here’s what I’m thinking. Part of doing what you have to do to come home to your loved ones every night involves walking away from a situation. So, Mike Brown stole some cigarillos. That’s really the kind of thing that can wait until you have decent backup to arrest the guy. He was caught on store cameras; he was well-known in the neighborhood (I mean, how many 6’4 280 lb guys are roaming around Ferguson). I don’t get why Wilson couldn’t have called for backup and waited.

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  12. In the interview with Wilson, he was asked that question. Why did you pursue the guy alone? He said that that is what he was trained to do. I don’t know. Maybe cops should be trained to not enter those situations alone.

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    1. He was told to say that by his PR people. Don’t take responsibility. Blame the job, not yourself. It’s what cops have to do, shoot unarmed people. He made many choices to escalate a confrontation when he could have de-escalated. He has to take responsibility for those. That he doesn’t makes me glad he will probably never be able to work as a police officer again.

      I also wonder how he managed to get punched in the right side of the face when he was in the driver’s seat.

      Also, the description of the police department’s “investigation” of the shooting reveals it to be completely pathetic. This is one area where the federal government can and probably should step in. We can’t know exactly what happened in that confrontation, but we can expect that evidence is collected professionally.

      All I know is this: between Ferguson, UVA, and all the football scandals, I am pretty much done with men. Feh.

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