To Indict Or Not To Indict - You Be The Jury

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Why is that?

The vast majority of people wouldn't attack an officer in the first place. If Brown was determined to run at Wilson and continue the attack, then some superficial wounds to the arm isn't going to slow him down (he already had a near lethal encounter a couple of seconds prior to this too).

Not to mention that even if he sustained lethal wounds to the chest, he still could have continued the assault and potentially killed Wilson.

It's happened many times before, with various outcomes.

I'm not saying that I know what happened one way or the other, I just think that Wilson's account sounds really strange and that a fair trial with a look at more evidence seems like the right thing to do.

Prosecutor McCulloch: "Several said he didn’t raise his hands, raised them briefly, or held his stomach."

Dorian Johnson: "The last shot he fired he was so close to the ground, it looked like to me he was already on the ground. His knees were, he was going down, he was already down before the last shot came.”

Officer Darren Wilson: "At this point it looked like he was almost bulking up to run through the shots, like it was making him mad that I'm shooting at him," Wilson said. Wilson said Brown approached to within eight to 10 feet of him. "I'm backpedaling pretty good because I know if he reaches me, he'll kill me," Wilson said. "And he had started to lean forward as he got that close, like he was going to just tackle me, just go right through me."

So, he was either putting his head down preparing to charge, or keeling over from being shot, when the fatal shot entered his skull...

I think this ought to have been investigate further, hence they should have had a manslaughter charge - with an actual trial jury who's job it is to discern as much of the truth as possible, not a jury who just think that's their job.

Like I said, Wilson should have retreated while maintaining visual contact with Brown. I'm not suggesting Wilson should have fled back to the police station. By maintaining visual contact with Brown from a safe distance while awaiting the arrival of backup, Wilson could have then intervened again if Brown's subsequent actions threatened the safety of someone else. He would have had to re-evaluate the situation and act accordingly. But as long as Brown was not presenting some sort of imminent threat to someone else, it seems to me the right thing to do was to observe from a safe distance and await backup.

But honestly this is just another hyped-up, hypothetical doomsday scenario designed to make it look as if a failure to kill Brown on the part of Wilson would somehow have inevitably lead to some even worse outcome. Could it have happened? Sure. But there's not a single shred of evidence to suggest that it would have. Instead, I guess, the idea is that we're supposed to think Brown had to die to prevent him from committing some future crime, the idea for which may not have even ever formed in his mind. Doesn't really hold water.




IMHO, this is a huge failure of public policy to a) allow such training to occur and b) to allow police to shield themselves with it after the fact. What public policy goal is advanced by having the police basically execute people? What law is better enforced? I know people will probably bring up officer safety but it seems to me that it would be exceedingly rare for a situation to arise where a trained police officer is in such danger that after firing a couple of shots they cannot pause to briefly re-evaluate the potential threat before continuing to fire. Not saying such a situation could never occur - the North Hollywood bank robbery shootout from many years ago comes to mind as a situation where I'd not fault the police pretty much no matter what level of force they used - but in the vast majority of cases, hails of bullets seem entirely unnecessary.

They did three autopsies, had numerous forensic doctors look at the evidence, many witnesses that supposedly saw what happened, did a FBI investigation as well as a police investigation ... what's left to investigate ?

The prosecutor said the witnesses mostly back up officer Wilson, specifically that Brown charged Wilson.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/us/wi ... -says.html

"The most credible eyewitnesses to the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., said he had charged toward Police Officer Darren Wilson just before the final, fatal shots, the St. Louis County prosecutor said Monday night as he sought to explain why a grand jury had not found probable cause to indict the officer".

If you charge officer Wilson with manslaughter, then you need to explain why these "crediable" witnesses are lieing.

Actually, no, because this was not a manslaughter trial. The proper place to demostrate that he is innocent is at an actual trial, not at a jury deciding whether or not they ought to have a jury discuss whether or not he's guilty (seriously, that's too... meta).

Something which seems to have slipped most peoples minds. Again, Wilson was not on trial. As pointed out by others, it is the job of a trial jury to determine the credibility of witnesses. If we only held trials when guilt was beyond reasonable doubt... well, why bother with the expense? Just autoconvict.

just to clarify ... I didn't say indict him .. I said charge him .. once they charge him with manslaughter then the burden of proof is on the state to make their case .. which would mean discrediting these "credible witnesses" to establish evidence that said manslaughter event did happen .... the state is required to *prove* their case beyond a reasonable doubt .. the jury doesn't have to do anything if the state can't prove their case ...

at least one Zimmerman juror said afterwards, "the state failed to prove their case .... "

Can't believe I'm agreeing fully with Magneto and Jacoby

OK, I double checked Wilson's police interview and he does say that Brown ran at him after previously using more ambiguous language.
Of the eyewitness reports I read (15 reports from 12 witnesses out of 30 reports), I think only one fully supported Wilson's account and I think that was the guy who changed his story three times (Witness 12). It might have been Witness 10 though. I'm having some trouble getting them to load now.

Here's the relevant section of Wilson's court testimony (full transcription):


Sounds like he was backpedaling. I don't think the accounts I read mentioned that.

This site has highlighted portions for their testimony regarding the "charging". For each testimony scroll down to the highlighted portion.

Witness 10: Mr. Brown did some kind of movement. Never put his hands up. Turned around, and charged the officer. Mr. Brown paused then the officer stopped firing. Then Mr. Brown resumed the charge, and the officer fired.
http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/ ... ss-10.html

Witness 14: said the officer loudly told Mr. Brown to stop but Mr. Brown kept coming towards him.

Witness 40 said Mr. Brown charged the officer like a football player

Can't go through them all .. but right now I believe the prosecutor when he says there are many credible African American witnesses that support officer Wilson's version.

Link from above:
http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/ ... ss-10.html

12 people spent 3 months poring over every detail in every "eye-witness" account and every piece of material evidence; all without being told what to believe by the popular Media.

[opinion=mine]

I believe that people who are dis-satisfied with their findings are simply disappointed that they won't be seeing a cop -- any cop -- become the blood sacrifice for the ills and evils that a small, uncivilized portion of society has brought upon itself.

Further, it is just plain stupid to protest against events and institutions that are located far, far away from Ferguson, and by people who have never even been to Missouri. The organizers of these protests have just been waiting for an excuse to smash windows, overturn cars, and loot stores, and they got their excuse when a white cop was found un-indictable for shooting a black man in self-defense, after the black man had taken illegal drugs, robbed a store, and attacked the cop to steal his gun.

The Grand Jury should be applauded for its efforts in the use of cool-headed reason to examine the facts of the case before reaching a verdict, instead of being swayed by public opinion and media manipulation.

It's now up to the Federal government to complete its own investigation. I doubt that they will find the officer any more culpable of wrong-doing that did the Grand Jury.

[/opinion]

LoveNotHate:

- witness 10 was 100 yards away
- witness 14 does not say or imply that Brown charged

So that's just witness 40 then...

Fnord:

So Brown's death was justified, in part, because he was a pot smoker and a shoplifter?

I don't think that prosecutors really like to go to the time and expense necessary to prosecute a case that they are most likely to lose.

I doubt that any of us would want to see prosecutors prosecute a case where they truly believe the person being prosecuted is innocent of charges.

If it were you that could be prosecuted, would you really like to have to spend a million dollars or more on lawyers fees for a case in which you are innocent just because someone else thinks that you should be prosecuted and let the jury determine if you are innocent?

I would classify a prosecutor's act of prosecuting someone he thinks is innocent to be malicious prosecution.

True, I think by "charging" they may mean headed directly towards.

The witnesses vary by what speed Mr.Brown was moving. As you said earlier, "walking" seems to be the majority opinion. Some say "fast walking/trotting", some say "taking steps", it is open to interpretation if the ones who say"charging" mean he was moving fast, or not.

It makes sense he was in a football player position as some reported him lurched over probably due to being shot. That would explain why he got hit in the top of the head as he approached.

Several witnesses reported him not responding to the officer's repeated request to stop.

For Manslaughter
==============
"Missouri law states that an officer may shoot someone who is reasonably feared to pose an imminent threat of death or serious injury to the officer or another person. Courts have ruled that officers may also shoot to stop someone suspected of a killing or grievous injury from fleeing if they pose others a serious threat".
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014 ... no-charges

Seems like Mr. Brown posed at least a risk of serious injury to the officer, so no reason to indict for manslaughter.

Last edited by LoveNotHate on 27 Nov 2014, 8:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

So apparently Misouri law makes it extremely easy to claim self-defense. It's a lot easier than what I would've thought. I had heard that self-defense is an affirmative defense and the burden of proof shifts to the defendant when it's used. This made me think that the case of Darren Wilson should go to trial. It'd be much easier to prosecute if it becomes "guilty until proven innocent" the moment Darren Wilson claims self-defense.

It doesn't actually work like that in Misouri. I'm not sure how many places actually function that way nowadays.

Here's an article explaining why it's so hard to prosecute Darren Wilson: http://www.newrepublic.com/article/119157/darren-wilsons-conviction-will-be-basically-impossible

All Darren Wilson has to do is testify that it was self-defense. That's enough evidence to protect him as long as the prosecution can't contradict it. He says he's innocent and that makes him innocent just because he says so.