U.S. Justice Department to investigate Ferguson police

Delighted to see the Justice Department taking this necessary step.

This one is on a fast track than gun running across border, Benghazi, and IRS targeted tea party. Justice must be pursue to all people, not just a political game. The policy of exploiting the minority for votes only benefit a few opportunists at the cost of their future. It is better to teach a person how to catch the fish rather than just feeding him or her all the time. When the principle and family structure are compromised, the future seem very bleak. Even Bill Cosby was criticized by these opportunists when he spoke out about chronic problem in the black community. It takes two to tango, isn't it!

This one is on a fast track than gun running across border, Benghazi, and IRS targeted tea party. Justice must be pursue to all people, not just a political GAME.

That is what I was thinking. The justice dept. didn't waste any time in pursuing this case, but when it came to Benghazi, the IRS, Lois Lerner, the Bergdahl case and so many countless other cases where Holder was beyond slow to react, but this, he is on it like a moth to a flame and he should, but don't just politicize one tragedy for racial or political reasons.

And yes, sadly the Black community is out of control, Black on Black crime is the leading cause of Black deaths. I wonder if Sharpton or Holder will speak about that?

a police department that is predominantly white even though Ferguson is about 70 percent black

I keep reading reports of Ferguson having 53 policemen and only three are black. However, I haven't seen any reports which indicate the number of black applicants for police duty or reports which indicate blacks have been systematically denied entry into the police force. If blacks aren't applying for police duty andor not being denied an opportunity to join the police force, the city shouldn't be criticized for having a predominately non-black police department.

@Toshi

Exactly, but also many Blacks are taught that the police are scum and terrorists and becoming a cop is like going against your race if you are Black and you are often criticized as a sell out.

And yes, sadly the Black community is out of control

How is the Black community of Ferguson out of control?

You paint an entire community with the same brush...

Indeed. But, often, ignorant racists help to make the point for the opposing side. The fact that a Justice Department investigation is warranted, it could well be the Ferguson PD that has gone out of control. Arresting journalists? Pointing loaded assault-type rifles at peaceful demonstrators?

@zichi

You continue and seem allowed to make racist comments when you clearly state sadly the Black community is out of control, and Black on Black crime is the leading cause of Black deaths. without even stating that the majority of murdered whites are killed by other whites. You paint an entire community with the same brush when even in Ferguson not all of the black community took part in the protests which included a number of white people too or riots.

I find your racist comment deeply offensive.

Really or is it more like, you refuse to accept the truth. Because I am pointing out the truth and every stat, EVERY SINGLE ONE backs that up, that all of a sudden makes me a racist? Quite the contrary, I think I would be a racist if I were to deny, conflate and make random excuses as to why Blacks are overwhelmingly killing themselves in record numbers. Also, if you don't want to accept the stats and dismiss them, then please go to California and tell me or show me ANY Black neighborhood besides Baldwin Hills that is totally clean safe, immaculate houses, cleanest neighborhoods, extremely low crime rates where everyone can walk down the streets, go into banks where you can still shake hands with the teller and go shopping without a security guard(s) at the exit and entrance checking bags and where you have a strong vibrant community with jobs galore and racially mixed. Please tell me.

@yabits

How is the Black community of Ferguson out of control?

Let me guess, when the people riot and loot, it wasn't there fault, right?

Indeed. But, often, ignorant racists help to make the point for the opposing side.

OR equally the racists that refuse to accept the fact that they do have a race problem and when people call them out on it, they attack the people that are seeing them for the opportunists they really are, Sharpton is one that comes to mind.

The fact that a Justice Department investigation is warranted, it could well be the Ferguson PD that has gone out of control.

I don't have a problem with that, but I just find it interesting how Holder was dragging his feet when it came to the IRS scandal and Benghazi, Lois Lerner, all you hear is stonewalling, but now Holder is right on it, getting deep in it, wants answers, great, but why this case for one person, but for thousands of Americans that were unjustly targeted for their political beliefs, nothing happens or 4 dead Americans, still no answers as to what exactly happened. That is acceptable? No, it's all racially and politically motivated. I have a problem with that.

Arresting journalists?

You mean the one incident where the police officer told the guy, I think he was from the AP to move and he was egging the officer on. When a cop tells you to move, don't argue, move! If you don't, and he arrests you, you are the one that looks stupid. You will never win against a cop going head to head like that. Never, so just comply and do as he says.

Pointing loaded assault-type rifles at peaceful demonstrators?

Throwing Molotov is peaceful? Huh, never realized that before, silly me.

Because I am pointing out the truth and every stat,

You said the "Black Community" is out of control.

Let me guess, when the people riot and loot,

What percentage of the "Black Community" in Ferguson were rioting and looting? Just the truth, please.

Blacks are overwhelmingly killing themselves in record numbers

Over the last decade, what has been the murder rate in Ferguson? Can you point out a truthful stat on that? One that supports your claim that --and we are talking about the community of Ferguson -- "Blacks are overwhelmingly killing themselves in record numbers."

What took Justice so long? It was obvious this was coming way back.

You said the "Black Community" is out of control.

In all the urban cities, they are.

What percentage of the "Black Community" in Ferguson were rioting and looting? Just the truth, please.

I am not so sure about the stats, but I'm sure the figures will be available soon enough. Let me ask you a question, how many Whites did you see joining in the looting or took the opportunity to loot? They were pretty much all Black. Who was it that burnt some of the peoples stores down?

Over the last decade, what has been the murder rate in Ferguson? Can you point out a truthful stat on that? One that supports your claim that --and we are talking about the community of Ferguson -- "Blacks are overwhelmingly killing themselves in record numbers."

Yabits, What has been the murder rate of cops killing Blacks in Ferguson. And I was referring to cities like Chicago and Philly, Oakland and Los Angeles. The gang violence, the disregard for property, life and authority. Why are Blacks incarcerated more than any other ethnic group?

Why are Blacks incarcerated more than any other ethnic group?

Funny you should ask...

In all the urban cities, they are.

All Black communities in urban cities are "out of control?" It's an interesting use of words in that, historically, Blacks were very much "under control" via slavery and Jim Crow laws. Nevertheless, this topic is about Ferguson; and when asked why you claimed the Ferguson black community was out of control, you pointed to rioting and looting. You also claimed to be here to point out the truth and statistics. And so when asked for the stats on what percentage of the Ferguson community was involved in rioting and looting, you suddenly shift the scene away from Ferguson to "urban cities."

In response to your statement that Blacks are "overwhelmingly killing themselves in record numbers," I note that you aren't able or willing to supply the truth or stats on what those rates were in Ferguson over the past decade. (The rate has been extremely low.)

And I was referring to cities like Chicago and Philly, Oakland and Los Angeles. The gang violence, the disregard for property, life and authority. Why are Blacks incarcerated more than any other ethnic group?

What you appear to be saying is that whites are justified in treating the black community in Ferguson -- and black communities everywhere -- as though they represented the very worst areas of Chicago, Philly, Oakland, and LA. (If one examines those cities, one finds that relatively small areas are responsible for the majority of crimes.) This is the same as blaming a majority of people, based on the color of their skin, for the evil deeds of a small percentage.

Or do you believe the majority of Blacks are evil, or "out of control?"

Let me ask you a question, how many Whites did you see joining in the looting or took the opportunity to loot?

You seem to be claiming that whites never riot or loot. Any cursory look at history would prove you wrong. (I realize you don't look at history. Try the WTO debacle in Seattle a few years ago.) What other reason would you have to ask that question except to try to infer that whites are superior to blacks. Yes, many whites do believe they are superior to people with dark skin. You appear to be part of that club.

Let me ask you a question, how many Whites did you see joining in the looting or took the opportunity to loot? They were pretty much all Black.

Um. I watched video of white people looting. Looters often show up during periods of civil unrest and mass protest. I would hazard to guess that the presence of looters does not necessarily say anything about community or the protesters, given that these groups are not necessarily connected.

When I think about the Ferguson incident now, I sometimes wonder whether this whole thing would have happened at all had Officer Wilson been black instead of white.

Michael Brown was a thug, plain and simple. The video tape of him robbing the convenience store accompanied by the use of physical force and intimidation minutes before he was shot is proof of this. Did you notice that Obama didn't say that Brown could've been his son as he did with Trayvon Martin? Of course he didn't, and who in their right mind would want to claim the likes of Michael Brown for a son after watching the convenience store video. What happened after the robbery is still being investigated, but Michael Brown was clearly a thug, not a "gentle giant".

I sometimes wonder whether this whole thing would have happened at all had Officer Wilson been black instead of white.

Well, probably because a black police officer would not have executed an unarmed black kid in the middle of the street.

Michael Brown was a thug, plain and simple.

Well, in a town which issued tens of thousands of citations a year, Michael didn't have any priors. So you are wrong.

Did you notice that Obama didn't say that Brown could've been his son as he did with Trayvon Martin?

And your point is....

but Michael Brown was clearly a thug, not a "gentle giant".

LOL!!! Brown could have put that guy in the hospital with little effort. Look at the video, not one single bag of snack foods falls off the rack -- that's how gently Brown pushed him aside after the guy tried to block him. I understand how racists want him to appear like a thug.

@yabits

A black male born in 1991 has a 29% chance of spending time in prison at some point in his life.

Nearly one in three African American males aged 20–29 are under some form of criminal justice supervision whether imprisoned, jailed, on parole or probation.

One out of nine African American men will be incarcerated between the ages of 20 and 34.

Black males ages 30 to 34 have the highest incarceration rate of any race/ethnicity.

Several studies have concluded that overall, more black males are in prison than are enrolled in colleges and universities.

In 2000 there were 791,600 black men in prison and 603,032 enrolled in college versus 1980, when there were 143,000 black men in prison and 463,700 enrolled in college. In 2003, according to Justice Department figures, 193,000 black college-age men were in prison, while 532,000 black college-age men were attending college. On an average day in 1996, more black male high school dropouts aged 20–35 were in custody than in paid employment; by 1999, over one-fifth of black non-college men in their early 30’s had prison records.

The government is building prisons based on third grade reading test scores. They can conclude whether or not a child will go to prison at some point if their literacy score is low. Recent national data from a study of beginning kindergartners show conclusively that African American males start school already behind other groups of children with respect to emergent reading and mathematical skills (ECLS-K, 1998). Thus, problems in elementary school may have roots in the preschool years. Most African American Children are behind on reading but excel in other subjects (Jencks & Phillips, 1998). The gaps don't stop in elementary school, but are evident in middle and high school if never caught up by the early elementary years (Gordon 2-4)

A new release as September 2012 from Schott Foundation finds only 52% of Black males graduate from high school. From 2001-2002 black males increased and by 10 percent, and 2010–11,was the first year that more than half the black males received a diploma according to Holzman, Michael (2012), Jackson, John H.; Beaudry, Ann, eds., The Urgency of Now: The Schott 50 state report on public education and black males, Schott Foundation for Public Education, retrieved 2014-03-02.

A 2012 study by the Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention revealed that in 2010 black youths committed six times more murders, three times more rapes, 10 times more robberies and three times more assaults than did their white counterparts.

Similar statistics were released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the “Uniform Crime Reports.” They determined, “In the year 2008, black youths, who make up 16% of the youth population, ACCOUNTED for 52% of juvenile violent crime arrests, including 58% for homicide and 67% for robbery.” By contrast, the only categories where white youths surpassed blacks were in liquor law violations and driving under the influence.

Even black civil rights advocates such as Van Jones, President Barack Obama’s former green jobs czar, confirmed these findings. In his October 5, 2005 article, “Are Blacks a Criminal Race?” Jones wrote, “African American youth represent 32% of all weapons arrests [and] were arrested for aggravated assault at a rate nearly three times that of whites.”

To better comprehend this trend, on January 10 AMERICAN FREE PRESS spoke with veteran journalist and author Alan Caruba. When questioned about the proliferation of black crime, Caruba explained, “The black community is afflicted with all kinds of problems based on a long history of failing to integrate fully into the overall community.”

Pointing to current events, Caruba explained: “The knockout GAME is a good example of what’s wrong today. It goes straight to the heart of how [blacks] are raised. It’s a disturbing trend that all of us need to pay more attention to.”

The so-called “knockout game” was made popular largely by gangs of teenage blacks who select a random person and try to knock them unconscious with one punch to the head or face.

Although few publications other than AFP have the courage to buck political correctness and address the actualities of this social cancer in a forthright manner, in a 2011 speech Philadelphia’s black Mayor Michael Nutter offered the following admonishment to black youths:

“You have damaged your own race,” he said. “Take those damned hoodies down. Pull your pants up and buy a belt because no one wants to see your underwear or the crack of your butt.”

Summarizing this entire matter was former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy who, on September 30, 2005 declared: “Some identifiable groups . . . commit crime at a rate that is higher than the national rate. Blacks are such a group. That is simply a fact.”

Yabits, you can dance, weave and dodge all you want. These are hard facts irrefutable. I grew up in Los Angeles and covered many, many gang stories, I've seen it with my own eyes. Pointing facts out is NOT racist, it's an epidemic needs to be addressed and I am sick and tired that many in the Black community as well as these so called Black leaders ONLY will jump to the opportunity when it is another race mostly (White) is involved and that in itself is totally racist!

Gosh, yabits. Did you even watch the video or are you just choosing to ignore it?

Michael Brown was no angel. He was a thug. It doesn't matter how hard you try to whitewash it, the video shows a completely different story.

You state: "Brown could have put that guy (shopkeeper) in the hospital with little effort."

Yeah, that's probably what the intimidated shopkeeper was thinking and why he was running away from Big Mike. Had the little shopkeeper stood up to Big Mike then I think Big Mike just might have put him in the hospital. He was smart to run away from a big, thieving thug like that.

@stormcrow

Exactly. The problem with Yabits and many liberals when it comes to race, they just want to ignore facts and want to shove EVERY societal problem on Whites, overlooking every stat and NOT wanting to address the Black on Black crime. Every week in Chicago, there is someone being murdered every 40 min. If these leaders really care and want to make a difference, they need to march and confront the problem where it really rests and that's in the Black community.

http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/il/chicago/crime/

@Zichi

The issue is, why did most of the Blacks in Ferguson riot and loot? What does the looting have anything to do with Brown. It's nationwide. Also, it goes both ways. There are many Blacks that hate Whites because they are White or have a preconceived notion that all Whites are racist, which equates to profiling or assuming that Whites are automatically racist people. But again, NO one wants to talk about that issue. Blacks have to equally share the responsibility and accept the honest truth that they don't want to hear and that is, racism exists in the Black community as well.

bass

The problem with Yabits and many liberals when it comes to race, they just want to ignore facts and want to shove EVERY societal problem on Whites, overlooking every stat and NOT wanting to address the Black on Black crime.

We're talking about Ferguson, which has not had a big problem of 'Black on Black crime'.

Your blanket statements about liberals are as ridiculous as your blanket statements about blacks.

And nice cut and paste job from the American Free Press. Did you know it's run by white supremacists?

bass4funk: The issue is, why did most of the Blacks in Ferguson riot and loot?

I kind of doubt "most" of the blacks in Ferguson were rioting and looting.

On Wednesday Aug.13, peaceful protestors were tear-gassed and shot at with rubber bullets by a police SWAT team. Several journalists were also arrested. The Ferguson police chief denied any suppression of the media.

The Ferguson police chief also claimed that he released the video of the convenience store incident allegedly featuring Brown because of all the pressure he received (via Freedom of Information Act requests) to make it available.

Well, some members of the media submitted a FoIA request to examine the Freedom of Information Requests directed to the Ferguson Police Department to release the video and -- lo and behold -- there was only one such request. This is a police department that clearly can NOT be trusted.

The video (again) is proof enough to raise awareness that Michael Brown was indeed a thug and capable of having a damaged enough frame of mind to challenge a police officer.

Of course the investigation is still far from over, but regardless of how nice all of the black people in the community of Ferguson seem to be, Michael Brown was a proven thug. The convenience store video is clear and convincing evidence of that.

Also, if there is proof of a violent assault by Brown upon Officer Wilson and an attempt by Brown to take the police officer's weapon, then it's hard to imagine that any jury would convict Wilson on the basis of reasonable doubt alone.

Another interesting aspect, the testimonies of the witnesses are questionable at best. How many different eye witness accounts are out there right now? It's all very confusing, and all it's going to take is a reasonably talented defence lawyer to present several of these eye witnesses on the stand with their different testimonies to a jury to make all of what they say highly questionable and virtually worthless in a court of law.

I also recognize that I'm being as presumptuous as some on here about their beliefs that Brown is innocent and Wilson is guilty, except I believe the exact opposite is true. I don't believe Officer Wilson was nuts, however, I do believe that Brown was a thug, not nuts, just a thug.

@Zichi, well said about the legacy of racial oppression, though you don't have to go back to the 1800s. Even in 1960s Mississippi there were entire counties without any black people registered to vote, law enforcement working to keep a single black student from integrating the state's largest public university, and so on. That is all first hand history for a lot of older people still alive today.

zichi,

Don't complain to me about it. Complain to the company which installed the security camera at the convenience store. My definition of thug is based pretty much on what their cameras recorded during the course of a crime in Ferguson, MO.

Just watch that video and tell me with a straight face that that 6'4", 300 lb. young man was not a thug. Oh, wait a minute. You already have seen it and you said he wasn't a thug. Then I guess we'll never be able to reach an agreement with each other on that point. Because if I see somebody waltz into a shop (followed by his faithful sidekick), brazenly start to steal stuff from behind the counter, straight-arm the shopkeeper in the throat on the way out, and then turn around and mencace back towards the shopkeeper towering over him, you would say I was overreacting (wouldn't you?) by calling such a man a thug. Incredible.

By the way, Officer Wilson also had no prior record and no record of making racist remarks, but you're ready to convict him anyway, aren't you? As for Big Mike, he may not have had any prior record but the video certainly shows, no, scratch that, proves that he was indeed changing for the worse and going through a rather dark transitional phase.

@plastic

We're talking about Ferguson, which has not had a big problem of 'Black on Black crime'.

But many of its citizens did take advantage of robbing and looting.

Your blanket statements about liberals are as ridiculous as your blanket statements about blacks.

But your constant criticism of conservatives and painting Whites as the racists and refusing to acknowledge that Blacks are also racist is Justified and NOT a Blank statement?

And nice cut and paste job from the American Free Press. Did you know it's run by white supremacists?

So you're trying to say it disqualifies them from the discourse of the discussion? I'd you also know that Sharpton is a Black racist? Why are you not outraged about that?

@zichi

The demonstrations also included a number of white people and other non Black people.

I'm not talking about the demonstrators. I'm talking about the rioters and looters.

On Wednesday Aug.13, peaceful protestors were tear-gassed and shot at with rubber bullets by a police SWAT team. Several journalists were also arrested. The Ferguson police chief denied any suppression of the media. CNN cameras filmed an officer addressing a group of protesters by saying "Bring it, you f++king animals, bring it." The Washington Post reporter Wesley Lowery and The Huffington Post reporter Ryan Reilley were among the journalists arrested.

And that officer was rightfully fired! You should never talk like that to anyone, I thought the cop was way out of line and got what he deserved.

As far as the Journalists Wesley Lowry, if I'm not mistaken had a verbal confrontation with an officer that was trying to clear out a Miki-D's. He was way out of line, stalling and ranting on, trying to get the officer to explode, but he kept his composure and Lowry was an idiot for doing that. You don't do that, when a cop tells you to move, you move, it's that simple! If he would have peppers sprayed him, that would have been within his rights, if the person is told to disperse and the person refuses to.

Your comments have reached a new level of racism but at least it now clear what your position is.

I had NO idea about pointing out the truth makes a person racist. Most White collar crimes are committed by Whites, in pointing that out, am I still a racist?

There were riots in Ferguson but didn't involve the majority of the Black community and also included people from elsewhere?

Watch the video and tell me how many Whites do you see? If you see the number is equal to the Blacks that were protesting on the streets, I'll bite my tongue.

There have been many instance of riots were the majority of the people were white. It was only 150 years ago that in places like St Louis and its suburbs such as Ferguson, Blacks were the property of whites. They were places of racial segregation for many decades. Racial injustice, even now and in spite of all the progress, remains the great enduring American national wound.

So now as an excuse that's the lefts and for many blacks the justifacations of high black crime. So then why are MOST of the major cities where Blacks live are in deplorable conditions? There is NO way on God's green Earth you'd walk through Compton or Watts at night. No Way! So why are the Asian neighborhoods in the states usually in prestine condition and the Black neighborhoods in the worst? Is that the fault of the fault of the White man as well?

@yabits

Well, some members of the media submitted a FoIA request to examine the Freedom of Information Requests directed to the Ferguson Police Department to release the video and -- lo and behold -- there was only one such request. This is a police department that clearly can NOT be trusted.

The police are NOT the only ones that can't' trusted! But Brown and his thuggish friends can be? Interesting how Holder is slow to react to anything. The IRS scandal, Lois Lerner tapes, we still don't have answers, seen nothing and Holder is dragging his feet. The minute a Black kid gets shot, he's done in Ferguson before the sun sets. Racially biased, politically motivated. Naaww!

By the way, Officer Wilson also had no prior record and no record of making racist remarks

One of the things the Justice Department does (and did) before deciding to launch an investigation is to conduct interviews with members of the community to determine if they ever filed formal complaints. Then they look at the number of complaints on file. A police department warrants investigation when the two do not add up.

The police chief told a bald-faced lie when he claimed that he was inundated with FoIA requests to release the video from the convenience store, despite a recommendation/request from the Justice Department that he not release it. This is a department capable of "cooking the numbers" on complaints as well -- so anything claimed about Officer Wilson has to be taken with a very large block of salt.

Before Ferguson, Wilson was part of a police force that the community had to completely disband because of the scale of abuse and corruption. Several members of the community had run-ins with Wilson and more than one considered him to be abusive.

As for the word "thug," I usually don't accept the word of a racist when defining a person by it. I will use it to describe a behavior. Yes, the man in the video behaved in a way that intimidated the store owner -- thuggish behavior perhaps. The police are certainly capable -- and have proven on numerous occasions that they can behave thuggishly too. But when a police officer points, fires, and empties his weapon against a citizen there has to be more than stealing cigars and pushing an employee out of the way (or jaywalking) involved. Especially if that suspect is fleeing for his life with his back turned and more than 20 feet from the person.

@zichi

Please provide a reliable link for your statement because the majority of the Ferguson Black community didn't even take part in the demonstrations over the death of Brown?

You are taking it out of context! I meant was a large portion of the Black community were out in full force protesting and there were many that were looting, I didn't mean all. Apology for the confusion, but regardless, you didn't see hundreds of Whites rioting and looting, did you? No, you didn't.

Were you unable to back up your claim with a reliable link? How many Black people from Ferguson were involved in the riots and looting.

I'm not going to address that again, I already explained and told you everything.

@yabits

The police chief told a bald-faced lie when he claimed that he was inundated with FoIA requests to release the video from the convenience store, despite a recommendation/request from the Justice Department that he not release it. This is a department capable of "cooking the numbers" on complaints as well -- so anything claimed about Officer Wilson has to be taken with a very large block of salt.

But the video doesn't lie. You fail to mention (as always) how Brown muscled his way through the store and steal blunts. As for Brown, he is dead and the dead don't speak, but sad as it is, Brown could have altered the events of that night, he chose to be confrontational and combative, which led ultimately to his death.

Before Ferguson, Wilson was part of a police force that the community had to completely disband because of the scale of abuse and corruption. Several members of the community had run-ins with Wilson and more than one considered him to be abusive.

And you can unequivocally say this without a reasonable doubt that without a shred of evidence that it's true. It is a known fact that he was part of this police force that terrorized Blacks? Seriously?

As for the word "thug," I usually don't accept the word of a racist when defining a person by it.

but that's what he was and that is what Brown was doing. He was thuggin' his way through the store.

I will use it to describe a behavior. Yes, the man in the video behaved in a way that intimidated the store owner -- thuggish behavior perhaps. The police are certainly capable --

I agree, they can be.

and have proven on numerous occasions that they can behave thuggishly too. But when a police officer points, fires, and empties his weapon against a citizen there has to be more than stealing CIGARS and pushing an employee out of the way (or jaywalking) involved.

Or it could be that the officer felt that his life was in danger and that there was NO other option, but to use deadly force.

Especially if that suspect is fleeing for his life with his back turned and more than 20 feet from the person.

Again, we don't know for sure, you could be right or you could be wrong or I could be either right or wrong, let the system work itself out and then once we get all the facts, we will have all the facts and can make a clear determination as to what happened, factually.

I didn't take anything out of context, I just take people for what they say and state. There have been riots involving mostly white people too, like the WTO.

Will you stop! We are NOT talking about the WTO. We are talking about Ferguson and a police officer that shot a kid and idiots like Al Sharpton inciting riots and race baiting and taking from the discourse! Also how Black and White relations are in that city and all across America as a whole.

Riots are not unique to the Black community.

I never said they were, but very often when in cases like these verdicts or indictments don't come down hard or the way they want it, there will usually always be repercussions within the Black communities.

Like I have stated several times, the majority of the Ferguson Black community didn't take part in the protests, riots or looting something which you have claimed several times that they did.

I already said, you took it out of context, move on.

It is a known fact that he was part of this police force that terrorized Blacks? Seriously?

It is a known fact that Wilson was a part of the police force of Jennings, Missouri, prior to joining the Ferguson force. It is a known fact that, while he as a part of the Jennings force, it had to be disbanded because of abuse towards citizens as well as corruption. I don't know why you choose words like "terrorized Blacks." There were abuses of authority which included police shootings of suspects.

It is a known fact that Wilson was not one of the twelve officers re-hired by the Jennings department. That's a very interesting and telling fact for a department that was now in need of good police officers.

how Brown muscled his way through the store

That is false. I have watched the video many times, from entrance to exit of the alleged robbery suspect. The person walked in and up to the counter as would any 6' 4" person weighing nearly 300 lbs. "Muscling" involves being in contact with other people, and the only person I saw the suspect actually come in contact with is the alleged owner.

Again, we don't know for sure, you could be right or you could be wrong

We can be sure, thanks to what police and witnesses have reported, that Brown and Johnson moved to around 30 feet from the police car -- where the original confrontation took place.

I have a basic belief that the vast majority of members of the Ferguson community (and the one witness who is not a resident of Ferguson, but was coming to pick up her friend for work) are decent, law-abiding and honorable. They are not rioters or looters and have a genuine, valid reason for being extremely upset at what they witnessed.

A person who believes that the majority of Ferguson residents (being African-American) are rioters, looters, or "out of control" is not likely to consider their eyewitness testimony with any degree of discernment or fairness. Their words are only useful for pointing out the kind of racism and ignorance they are representative of.

@bass4funk

These are hard facts irrefutable.

Funny thing about facts, especially statistics, is that they require interpretation... and interpreting facts is actually a pretty hard thing to do. Lets return to your previous question:

Why are Blacks incarcerated more than any other ethnic group?

Well. two possible answers present themselves immediately:

1) Blacks commit a disproportionate amount of crime. 2) The justice system is biased against blacks.

Now, I take it from the tone of your posts that you favor the first explanation. However, I would point out that these two explanations are not mutually exclusive; I would hazard to guess that both statements are true to a degree.

That the justice system is biased against blacks is shouldn't be particularly difficult to accept; in fact, after hundreds of years of institutional racism from slavery to segregation to redlining and racial profiling, it would be surprising if it wasn't. But the biases are pretty easy to demonstrate on their own. Take drugs for example - studies show that blacks and whites use drugs at pretty much the same rates, but that blacks are much more likely to be arrested, convicted and incarcerated for drug related offenses than their white counterparts. Sentencing, too, is biased as possession of drugs like crack cocaine, which are more prevalent in black and poor communities, are punished more severely than drugs like regular cocaine, which are more prevalent in white and wealthy communities, despite the fact that - contrary to what you may have heard in the 80s and 90s, crack isn't really much more addictive/worse for you than coke is.

So, if we can accept that the system is biased we can explain a decent portion of the disparity right of the bat. How much? Impossible to tell, but let's not let the "black community" off the hook just yet, shall we... remember, these are not mutually exclusive arguments. Instead, lets take a look at the other hypothesis: that blacks commit a disproportionate amount of crime.

For the sake of argument, lets assume this theory is also true. What is the next step? Well, the obvious question becomes why? Again, two possibilities immediately present themselves:

1) There is some defect in blacks and/or the black community which causes a disposition toward crime. 2) There is some outside condition which disproportionately effects the black community which correlates with crime.

Again, neither argument is a mutually exclusive one, though this time I'm a lot more wary of accepting the first proposition; perhaps its the liberal side of me, but the first concept is veering uncomfortably close to racist territory. I'd prefer to explore all my options before leaping to any conclusions which assigns inherent inferiority to a particular culture or ethnic group.

So lets explore the second option, then. Again, an obvious answer can be found in racism; while blacks are certainly not the only group to suffer racism in America, both the quantity and quality of that racism are sufficiently different to make the position of blacks unique in American history. There are all sorts of reasons why being rejected by the dominant culture might lead to the sort of issues we are discussing, but I think you'll agree that this answer is a bit too easy. Let's put it aside for now.

The next most obvious answer is poverty; ie, that poorer people commit more crimes than wealthier ones, and that blacks commit a disproportionate amount of crimes because blacks are disproportionately poor.

Again, this shouldn't be too hard to accept. When you reference the "black community" its pretty clear you are talking primarily about poor, inner-city communities. It should come as any surprise that these communities suffer the same sorts of crime related problems as their counterparts across the globe, where a large number of people with little or no economic prospects, little access to education or advancement, poor personal security, poor access to medical services and nutrition, limited physical and social mobility, and etc... are concentrated.

In this sense, what is originally conceptualized as a "black" problem, can instead be seen as a "urban poverty" problem.

To put it another way, have you ever had "soul food," bass4funk? For Japanese readers who may not be in the know, "soul food" is a traditional African-American cuisine that involves things like fried chicken, collard greens, cornbread, and other related dishes. The thing is, while "soul food" is a urban black thing up north, turns out that if you go down south "soul food" is nothing but "southern food," and there is very little actually "black" about it; black communities simply took the cuisine popular with poor southerners with them when the emigrated to northern urban centers looking for work and attempting to escape southern racism and segregation. So, something that looks uniquely "black" turns out to be not unique at all...

If you can accept that blacks are disproportionately poor, then again, we can explain a lot of the statistics you have provided. You could go on to ask "why" blacks are disproportionately poor... the racist answer would be that blacks are inherently unintelligent and/or lazy, but we can brush that aside pretty easily, because here the history of American racism provides us with a much more compelling explanation: that racial bias and institutional racism - from slavery and Jim Crow, to redlining and urban housing projects that concentrated poverty into urban ghettos - and have combined to systematically deprive black communities of wealth. It would be really hard for anyone to argue against this viewpoint, given the mountains of historical evidence we have here; also important to note, things like redlining are pretty recent and not at all "ancient history" as some might consider slavery... while we have made leaps and bounds in terms of racial equality, its unquestionable that racism still persists and is actively disadvantaging blacks as we speak, "affirmative action" and "political correctness" not withstanding (seriously, neither of those even come close to reversing the black-white power dynamic, whatever you may think of them as policies). Again, this is pretty easy to demonstrate: studies show, for instance, that employers are much more likely to consider a job application with a traditionally white name than a distinctively black one, even when in reality, the applications are otherwise identical. (And if you aren't familiar with the practice of redlining, go look it up an educate yourself.)

(Looks like I've run into some sort of limit; to be continued as soon as someone makes an enabling post...)

But when a police officer points, fires, and empties his weapon against a citizen there has to be more than stealing CIGARS and pushing an employee out of the way (or jaywalking) involved.

Why does there 'have to be more than stealing CIGARS and pushing an employee out of the way (or jaywalking) involved for a police officer to point, fire, and empty his weapon against a citizen? Can't it be that this particular police officer acted incorrectly? Isn't that possible as well? So far, I have seen no evidence that the police officer's actions in shooting and killing Brown were reasonable and correct. Stealing cigars and jaywalking certainly do not fit the bill, that is for sure.

(Thanks, Zichi; now I can post the rest of it.)

Ok then, so where does that leave us? A significant portion of of the incarceration statistics provided can be explained by bias in the system, and disproportionate poverty, lets assume - again, for the sake of argument - that there is indeed a defect in the "black community", that it is "broken" in some way...

Given all you know about the history of racism and disenfranchisement, would it surprise you? I mean, I would defy any community to survive hundreds of years of such treatment and come through unscathed. We, the white community, have spent an enormous amount of effort keeping the black community poor, uneducated, and without opportunity. We have concentrated poverty into ghettos, and made it very difficult to get out. We have set up a justice system that is primed to remove young black males from society and put them in prison, and then deny them any real opportunity to go legit when they get out. (The fact then neither your nor I personally may have contributed to this, or asked to benefit from it, is neither here nor there.) It seems incredibly disingenuous, after all this, to point at Ferguson and say, "Well, look, the black community is out of control!"

What, then, is the point of all this? Its to recognize, to what degree the American black community has problems, that the problems, by in large, do not originate internally, and thus cannot be resolved internally. It isn't good enough to point the finger at black people and tell them they need to shape up - black community leaders and pastors have been singing that song for decades now, though you may not have notices, telling kids to pull up their pants, get out of gangs and off of drugs, and to go get a job. That's not enough, and it's not the black communities fault that it isn't. We, collectively, as the American people, have had a hand in creating these problems and we, collectively, have a responsibility to find a solution.

I have been speaking so far under the presumption that you are here in the spirit of dialog and debate, and not just here to spout, frankly, rather racist-sounding rhetoric. But statements like this:

The issue is, why did most of the Blacks in Ferguson riot and loot?

sharply undercut that presumption; the idea that "most of the Blacks in Ferguson" are rioting and looting is preposterous on its face. "Most of the Blacks in Ferguson" were probably at home with their heads down, hoping things will blow over and that the can get back to living their lives - because "Blacks" are people, and that's what most ordinary people would do, and it goes the same for Muslims in Syria or ethnic-Russians in Donetsk. You owe it to the people of Ferguson to treat them like individuals and not as some sort of unanimous collective, because treating individuals as such is what not being racist is all about.

@yabits

It is a known fact that Wilson was a part of the police force of Jennings, Missouri, prior to joining the Ferguson force. It is a known fact that, while he as a part of the Jennings force, it had to be disbanded because of abuse towards citizens as well as corruption. I don't know why you choose words like "terrorized Blacks." There were abuses of authority which included police shootings of suspects.

It is a known fact that Wilson was not one of the twelve officers re-hired by the Jennings department. That's a very interesting and telling fact for a department that was now in need of good police officers.

It is a known fact by whom? Because you say so? So what police force and where did you find out about this so called Jennings force Yabits? Come on now...

That is false. I have watched the video many times, from entrance to exit of the alleged robbery suspect. The person walked in

Brown, yes, please continue....

and up to the counter as would any 6' 4" person weighing nearly 300 lbs. "Muscling" involves being in contact with other people,

Which he pushed the store clerk aside with the box of cigars in his hand, go on....

and the only person I saw the suspect actually come in contact with is the alleged owner.

in the store, which was probably the person he pushed aside.

We can be sure, thanks to what police and witnesses have reported, that Brown and Johnson moved to around 30 feet from the police car -- where the original confrontation took place.

Again, these are NOT 100% concrete facts and again, you act as if you know more than the police and the FBI and the prosecutors.

I have a basic belief (exactly a belief, is in your mind something that could be or a possibility of being) that the vast majority of members of the Ferguson community (and the one witness who is not a resident of Ferguson, but was coming to pick up her friend for work) are decent, law-abiding and honorable.

Ok, got it, that is YOUR belief and you may or may not be right. The same goes for officer Wilson and his side of the story as well as his witnesses. He also deserves the same curtesy.

They are not rioters or looters and have a genuine, valid reason for being extremely upset at what they witnessed.

So that gives people the right to rob and loot?

A person who believes that the majority of Ferguson residents (being African-American) are rioters, looters, or "out of control" is not likely to consider their eyewitness testimony with any degree of discernment or fairness. Their words are only useful for pointing out the kind of racism and ignorance they are representative of.

Well said. And that goes both ways towards Whites as well. FYI, Yabits.

@zichi

I know that article from Kimberly Kindy, she's partisan and although she is a very good reporter, I'll hold off until a reporter comes that is less bias in their reporting.

@zichi

The linked article is from Carol D. Leonnig, Kimberly Kindy and Joel Achenbach not just Kimberley Kindy. Hard to deny the evidence when presented to you on a plate.

That is a partisan hit piece, I am very well aware of Kindy's work and Achenbach and yes, it is overwhelmingly Kindy as an editor, she is also allowing and approving many of the stories, there is NO counter argument, her POV is one-sided and she is NOT challenged on her POV. That is NOT fair journalism.

Funny coming from you since your opinions and comments on the events and issues have also been bias?

Sorry, everything that I have posted along the topic of African Americans can be cross-referenced, if you think that there is Not a problem in the Black community then that is your opinion, I grew up next door to a very large Black community and the facts speak for themselves.

@bass

But your constant criticism of conservatives and painting Whites as the racists and refusing to acknowledge that Blacks are also racist is Justified and NOT a Blank statement?

I defy you to find a comment of mine painting all whites as racists. And, for the record, I do not refuse to acknowledge that blacks can also be racist. But that is not what we are discussing. The issue is Ferguson and, by most accounts, a systemic problem of racism in the police force. You are pooh-poohing that by offering up straw men. 'Black on black' violence is not a race issue, it is a socioeconomic problem that is not race driven.

You decry the lack of attention given to this 'black on black' violence. It has been addressed by black leaders often, including (among many others) Al Sharpton, the President, and the First Lady. The problem is not ignored by liberals or blacks. You just have a bee in your bonnet that the issue is not being brought up now (except by the fringe right media) in the context of Ferguson. It has nothing to do with Ferguson.

the American Free Press. Did you know it's run by white supremacists? -- So you're trying to say it disqualifies them from the discourse of the discussion?

Yes. White supremacists are disqualified from this discussion. And they lend no credibility to your arguments.

I can mostly agree with that plasticmonkey says above. The biggest part of the problem, in my opinion, is that the US hasn't really developed a good way of having a dialogue about race.

It's true that the case is about the actions of the police force in Fergusen. Unfortunately, when I see a racial issue come up I do tend to think the media trips over their own dicks presenting it. They have a process for marketing everything nowadays and they go into race mode when something like this happens. So I can see bass' point, but it's not the only point to discuss and that's all the Right wants to discuss at times.

I also know that the black community does have internal issues that can be swept under the carpet when incidents like this come up. But plastic's point holds that it's not the focus and it isn't the time to be talking about that when you have racist, militant cops arresting people on a whim. It's time to focus on them.

There are just so many distractions and agendas that can get in the way of what the focus should be and the US isn't good at sorting it out.

That is a partisan hit piece, I am very well aware of Kindy's work and Achenbach and yes, it is overwhelmingly Kindy as an editor, she is also allowing and approving many of the stories, there is NO counter argument, her POV is one-sided and she is NOT challenged on her POV. That is NOT fair journalism.

So please answer zichi's question as follows: "What is it you are denying, that the Jennings police dept wasn't shut down or that Wilson never worked there before the Ferguson police dept?"

Is it fact or opinion that the city council of Jennings, Missouri, abolished their police department in March of 2011? Is it a fact or an opinion that the officer involved in the shooting death of Michael Brown, Darren Wilson, was working for the Jennings police department when it was abolished?

@plastic

I defy you to find a comment of mine painting all whites as racists.

Meaning your constant attack on ANYTHING conservative, especially when it comes to race matters seems to give the impression that from your statements that Whites are the problem and all Blacks are the victims of so called White oppression, that is the perception that you give and perception means everything.

And, for the record, I do not refuse to acknowledge that blacks can also be racist. But that is not what we are discussing. The issue is Ferguson and, by most ACCOUNTS, a systemic problem of racism in the police force. You are pooh-poohing that by offering up straw men. 'Black on black' violence is not a race issue, it is a socioeconomic problem that is not race driven. You decry the lack of attention given to this 'black on black' violence. It has been addressed by black leaders often, including (among many others) Al Sharpton, the President, and the First Lady.

Really, not often enough, because it is not resonating enough within the Black community. And having Sharpton on your side will kill any integrity and credibility you might have if you want a race baiter like that to represent you.

The problem is not ignored by liberals or blacks.

On the contrary, Racism is used by liberals constantly on virtually any agenda when it involves dealing with Immigration, employment, education, crime and other social issues as a weapon to derive from the discourse.

You just have a bee in your bonnet that the issue is not being brought up now (except by the fringe right media) in the context of Ferguson. It has nothing to do with Ferguson.

Are you sleeping, of course it's being brought up. Yabits in particular is constantly going on about Ferguson cops are racist and that Wilson was racist and we don't know that yet. Let the facts speak for themselves as well as the progressive ueber liberal bias media.

Yes. White supremacists are disqualified from this discussion. And they lend no credibility to your arguments.

I agree, but we are NOT talking about White Supremacists. Nothing I loathe more in life is someone that is racist!

@zichi

I already clarified my position on Ferguson, I was talking more about the African American community throughout the US in general. Please stop going around in circles.

“The black community is afflicted with all kinds of problems based on a long history of failing to integrate fully into the overall community.”

What? Seriously? There are more than enough stats and facts that concur and can that match. Every single stat proves this. Alan Caruba is just one person and by the way, have you met Caruba? Are you sure he is a card carrying racist of the utmost? Having a personal opinion does NOT make a person a racist. Again, I lived next to an all Black community, I saw the decline the crime, the degradation of it. I have spent enough time in Oakland and Chicago and Harlem and I know firsthand, so from my dealings in these communities and what you might think is not the issue, I am going on facts and experiences.

Alan Caruba in his blog post fails to mention that Obama was put into the White House by the voters, for two terms.

You also forget to mention that he also said at one point, many, many Americans have buyers remorse now as well. But they are waking up, finally.

@yabits

So please answer zichi's question as follows: "What is it you are denying, that the Jennings police dept wasn't shut down or that Wilson never worked there before the Ferguson police dept?"

I didn't deny anything.

Is it fact or opinion that the city council of Jennings, Missouri, abolished their police department in March of 2011? Is it a fact or an opinion that the officer involved in the shooting death of Michael Brown, Darren Wilson, was working for the Jennings police department when it was abolished?

That is beside the point, there is NO concrete hard based backed up fact(s) in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that Wilson had ANY violent tendencies or any hostilities towards Blacks. We don't know that yet. Just like I will not say that Wilson is either guilty or innocent either way, I will wait for the facts to come out. Now if you want to condemn the man based on your perceived opinion, you are entitled to do that. But I thank the almighty that our judicial system doesn't follow and doesn't convict a person on a belief or he said, she said and that is based on facts and evidence. Thank God for that. And as such, until the raw facts come out on Wilson and the entire case, I am not ruling anything out.

yabits,

I don't get it.

Why are the pro-Michael Brown supporters so upset about the public realease of the assault & robbery caught on the security camera video?

It is relevant, not racist, just relevant. You could go off the deep end again about this being racist, but the argument is a poor one. I guess the truth hurts. I haven't heard any other arguments against it other than it shows Brown in a negative light breaking the law minutes before his confrontation with the police officer. Again, it's relevant, not racist, just relevant.

As for thug, it's not a racist term and thugs come in all colors. When I watch the video of the assault & robbery starring Michael Brown, it's easy to visualize Big Mike in a Nazi brown shirt uniform with a swastika armband on his sleeve roughing up a Jewish shopkeeper and loving it. That's a thug and if Big Mike had been born white in the 1920s in Nazi Germany, I'm sure he would have made an excellent thug.

When asked whether or not Wilson worked for the Jenning Police Department -- which was abolished by the community in 2011, you now say: "That is beside the point..."

Yet, when those facts were first brought up, you made it a point by writing the following:

It is a known fact by whom? Because you say so? So what police force and where did you find out about this so called Jennings force Yabits? Come on now...

Yes, come on now. The city of Jenning, Missouri, did have an actual police force until March of 2011. It was not a "so-called" police force but an actual one that Darren Wilson worked for for two years before it was abolished by the community. By now claiming that those facts are "beside the point,' you are at least conceding they are facts.

there is NO concrete hard based backed up fact(s) in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that Wilson had ANY violent tendencies or any hostilities towards Blacks.

One gets the sense that even if their were, you would declare them to be beside the point. What is known about the Jenning department is that relations were very bad between the police and the African-American community. The incident that may have put the nail in their coffin was a shooting by a white police officer at a black woman over a routine traffic stop -- with her child in the car -- all caught on video.

What is also known is that a select handful of Jenning police officers were immediately re-hired. In a department as disgraced as Jenning's was, this can only mean that they were seen as "good" police. Wilson was not among those asked to come back. That is an indication that he did nothing to earn the trust of the community. And now, his actions, and his actions alone, have put the Ferguson department under tremendous scrutiny.

Never heard of Caruba but that post is not enough to say he's racist, unless you see racists under every Bush (har har).

Bush got the same sort of flack from the left when he was pres. And he'd actually managed something bigger than a senatorial staff or university newsroom.

@zichi

Alan Caruba is an outspoken racist and hates Muslims is an indication of that. He is a hater of many things including GAYS?

Question, if I "hate" radical Islamists, gays and Black liberals, does that make me a racist?

Except that Darren Wilson like all the other police officers at Jennings were dismissed for hostilities towards Blacks. For a whole police dept to be shut down and the entire police forced fired must have been a very serious situation and I don't see how Darren Wilson's behavior at the Jennings police dept. would have been any different than his fellow officers?

Again, I am NOT putting a block of salt in it until otherwise totally proven without a doubt.

There are a number of important areas which the investigation needs to look at. The store video showing Brown, was released quickly with claims from the Ferguson police chief claiming it was because of requests from the media, when it turns out there were none?

But he did thug his way through thinking he can snag some cigars.

The Fergusion police chief claimed the officer Darren Wilson was attacked by Brown and beaten about his head with injuries enough that the deputy police chief took to a hospital for treatment. I guess there would have been photo's of Wilson's injuries but they haven't so far been released to the public.

It could be true and Zichi, if it proves to have been the situation then what? You and Yabits will apologize for jumping the gun?

The investigation needs to review why in the Ferguson polic dept. there are only 3-4 Black officers.

Because many Blacks wouldn't dream of being a cop, because it would be like going against the holy grail of snitching' it's NOT that they are NOT qualified, but many Blacks see the police as the enemy, so there is a whole dichotomy as to why many Blacks basically are not interested in being police officers in that city perhaps.

The store video tape was quickly released I believe to try and put Brown in bad light and justify his killing by the police even though at the time of the shooting officer Wilson wasn't aware of what happened in the store?

WTF??? No ONE had to put Brown in a bad light!! He did that on his own thuggin' his way into the store using his enormous size to intimidate the store clerk and bully his way out with the cigars. NO ONE made Brown steal those cigars! He did that all by himself and what did he get out of being a criminal? A couple of bullets. Sad, but that's on him.

@yabits

When asked whether or not Wilson worked for the Jenning Police Department -- which was abolished by the community in 2011, you now say: "That is beside the point..."

Yes, that's correct.

Yet, when those facts were first brought up, you made it a point by writing the following:

It is a known fact by whom? Because you say so? So what police force and where did you find out about this so called Jennings force Yabits? Come on now...

Yes, come on now. The city of Jenning, Missouri, did have an actual police force until March of 2011. It was not a "so-called" police force but an actual one that Darren Wilson worked for for two years before it was abolished by the community. By now claiming that those facts are "beside the point,' you are at least conceding they are facts.

No, what I am saying is, you don't know what the officer had in his head. You don't know his state of mind and his relationship and feelings towards Blacks. You are prejudging Yabits, which equals to being a racist. Now you are contradicting yourself. Officer Wilson under the law is presumed innocent until proven guilty, which has not happened yet. We don't know if he harbored racial prejudices towards Blacks or had any malice towards them. We just don't know that yet.

One gets the sense that even if their were, you would declare them to be beside the point. What is known about the Jenning department is that relations were very bad between the police and the African-American community. The incident that may have put the nail in their coffin was a shooting by a white police officer at a black woman over a routine traffic stop -- with her child in the car -- all caught on video.

That may be, but we still don't know what Wilson's state of mind was at the time. Funny, how you want to drive that narrative as if you did know.

What is also known is that a select handful of Jenning police officers were immediately re-hired. In a department as disgraced as Jenning's was, this can only mean that they were seen as "good" police.

Maybe they were and the really bad police were fired and rightfully so. Could be and quite possible.

Wilson was not among those asked to come back. That is an indication that he did nothing to earn the trust of the community. And now, his actions, and his actions alone, have put the Ferguson department under tremendous scrutiny.

Again, you don't know that. Please stop making false accusations like that unless you have some document that says Wilson was NOT asked to come back.

Question, if I "hate" radical Islamists, gays and Black liberals, does that make me a racist?

I think you really need to take a breath and look back at where you are in this conversation, because I am not sure it is where you think you are or where I think you want to be. At least, I hope not. In answer to your question, 'hating gays and Black liberals' would make the person doing the hating a bigot in my opinion.

Now, again in my opinion, taking away the smokescreens of completely unrelated events and topics, the real question is: Does there seem to be any evidence that shooting and killing Brown was justified? With all the talk about citizens in Ferguson, blacks in the US and other sundry topics, this question still has not been answered. In this case, it is the only question that really matters.

Also, based on what I have seen in the internet and news in recent years, it seems to be many members of police organizations and security staff that appear to be out of control. The police in any country as supposed to be there to serve and protect the public. But, lately, it seems like the job description has slowly changed in the US to protect a system that is slowly taking away the freedoms of citizens in the US.

I realize this is only my opinion as an outsider, but I am calling them as I see them.

bass, I asked you:

I defy you to find a comment of mine painting all whites as racists.

and you responded with this gem

Meaning your constant attack on ANYTHING conservative, especially when it comes to race matters seems to give the impression that from your statements that Whites are the problem and all Blacks are the victims of so called White oppression, that is the perception that you give and perception means everything.

Let me ask you again for specific comments I have posted. Your 'perception' is not an authority on how I feel about race. I have never said anything remotely insinuating that 'whites are the problem and all blacks are the victims of so called white oppression'.

if I "hate" radical Islamists, gays and Black liberals, does that make me a racist?

No, but I would say you've got some real anger issues.

and that's the police reports for ... and more importantly what happened at the scene of the shooting.

After the shooting, the police immediately consulted their attorneys who essentially directed them to release as little information as possible. This is, of course, uncharacteristic of a public service agency unless, that is, the information would be too self-incriminating. They knew who shot 12 bullets at and killed the alleged cigar-thief and jaywalker, Michael Brown, within minutes after the event. And yet it took them nearly a week to release Wilson's name.

Ferguson has a population of around 21,000. Yet, in 2013, according to state records, Ferguson issued nearly 34,000 arrest warrants for nonviolent offenses -- mainly traffic violations. (source: https://www.courts.mo.gov/file.jsp?id=68845)

What public defender advocacy groups have alleged, and what appears to be coming to light now, is that many of the courts in St. Louis County engage in "illegal and harmful" practices of charging very high court fines and fees on these nonviolent offenses, and then arresting people when they can't pay. This is why the Justice Department has expanded its investigation to encompass the entire county and not just Ferguson.

The system appears designed to encourage the police and court-systems to be revenue-generators through aggressiveness. Also, with that many warrants issued, there are going to be complaints filed. What journalists who are digging into this are finding (via FoIA requests) is that, in Ferguson, a complaint that was filed would be attached to the case number, but never to the officer's file. So that makes it easy for a police department to mistreat people and still claim that any particular officer's record is "clean."

Regarding, Wilson, or any other officer on that force: What kind of relationships did they develop with the community they served? If I was serving that area, I would know who the community leaders are, and they would know me. I would make time, even on my off time, to sit down and listen to them and hear their perception of what the problems are that they are facing. As much as they would feel inclined to accept me in, I would accept every invitation for community events, weddings, funerals, graduations, whatever. In an community that has been as under-served and over-policed as Ferguson has been, it's about the best way to build up a trusting relationship so that lethal force would be something used extremely rarely -- and certainly not in a case like the one involving Michael Brown.

What Brown's community could say -- with 100% accuracy -- about Wilson is that "he would have sooner shot them than showed any deference or respect." And that is a serious problem.

So, while some what to make the case on whether there were -- quoting: "NO concrete hard based backed up fact(s) in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that Wilson had ANY violent tendencies or any hostilities towards Blacks" -- there are also no concrete, hard-based, backed-up facts in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that demonstrate that Wilson involved himself positively and respectfully with the community he was supposed to serve. In four years serving that community, can he even get one African-American community leader to say a word on his behalf? That may be the most damning evidence against him.

What we know here is that ones who claim that the African-Americans in Ferguson were out of control, mainly rioting and looting, seem to sympathize with the killer of Michael Brown.

@zichi

Oh! it's without doubt that the entire Jennings police dept was shut down and every police officer fired. You see, it's just a case of looking at public records. How much proof do you need when an entire police dept is dismissed and just how often do you think that would happen?

I am aware that they were dismissed, but that doesn't mean that they were all racists or hostile to Blacks, just like, not all Blacks are criminals and thugs, right?

I haven't jumped the gun about again and if you check my comments about officer Darren Brown I have said very little and not a single negative word about him.

I was talking about Wilson and yes, you did.

I'm afraid that's just more pie-in-the-sky from you that Black people don't want to be police officers, when so many of them are, or lawyers, judges, prison wardens, CEO's of fortune 500 companies, doctors and professors at universities?

You seem to think you know what's in the minds of Black people when quite plainly you don't.

Actually, I know more about how Black people think then you know.

Another very important documents not released by the Ferguson police to date, even though it now nearly one month since Michael Brown was killed, and that's the police reports for what happened in the store and more importantly what happened at the scene of the shooting. Why haven&'t the police released these along with photo's of the alleged injuries to officer Wilson?

I'm with you on that. I have said all along, Wilson should give his side of the events that happened on that day. This would clarify a lot of confusion as to what happened that day.

@yabits

What Brown's community could say -- with 100% accuracy -- about Wilson is that "he would have sooner shot them than showed any deference or respect." And that is a serious problem.

So EVERYONE meaning all Blacks think likeminded? Reverse Black discrimination perhaps? Seems like it.

So, while some (sounds like you are talking about...me) what to make the case on whether there were -- quoting: "NO concrete hard based backed up fact(s) in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that Wilson had ANY violent tendencies or any hostilities towards Blacks" -- there are also no concrete, hard-based, backed-up facts in detailed writing from multiple witnesses that demonstrate that Wilson involved himself positively and respectfully with the community he was supposed to serve. In four years serving that community, can he even get one African-American community leader to say a word on his behalf?

I wonder why....Hmmmmm...Oh, I do know why.

That may be the most damning evidence against him.

If those ARE the facts, but we don't know yet.

What we know here is that ones who claim that the African-Americans in Ferguson were out of control, mainly rioting and looting, seem to sympathize with the killer of Michael Brown.

And you have people that sympathize with a thief that thought he was above the law and Kryptonite couldn't hurt him, but a bullet did, that is a fact.

And you have people that sympathize with a thief that thought he was above the law and Kryptonite couldn't hurt him, but a bullet did, that is a fact.

The simple fact is that it was Wilson's actions, and Wilson's actions alone, have brought this necessary investigation upon the system of justice in Ferguson and St. Louis County.

The simple fact is that it was not Wilson vs. Brown as much as it was Wilson vs. the community he was supposed to be serving. Most people with a shred of decency can sympathize with a neighborhood that had to witness (and possibly fall victim to) a police officer running amok and unloading his weapon and killing a young man in broad daylight -- shooting him twice in the head and then having him left out in the middle of the street for many hours. All on a Saturday, starting shortly after the noon hour.

Anyone claiming moral values derived from Judeo-Christian roots -- even those which call for an "eye for an eye" -- a death sentence is not warranted for someone who jaywalks, steals cigars, or even strikes a person (unless the blow is mortally serious). In that sense, people with any decency should be able to feel concern about a victim executed the way multiple eyewitnesses claim that Brown was. It would be a perversion of justice in the very highest sense to assert that a death penalty was warranted, or to assert that the killer should escape justice himself.

What Brown's community could say -- with 100% accuracy -- about Wilson is that "he would have sooner shot them than showed any deference or respect." And that is a serious problem.

So EVERYONE meaning all Blacks think likeminded?

It's called a consensus opinion. Just as witnesses here can assert that you have absolutely no respect whatsoever for the Black Community of Ferguson, having called them "out-of-control" (read: deserving to die) and "rioters" and "looters." It is easy to understand why you sympathize with a killer.

In four years serving that community, can Wilson even get one African-American community leader to say a word on his behalf? To which you replied

I wonder why....Hmmmmm...Oh, I do know why.

I believe most who read you can perceive what you think you know. And why you didn't care to write out that "knowledge," as it would be yet another in a string of racist remarks.

Four years in serving the community and not one letter or piece of evidence of anything positive Wilson did for the majority community in Ferguson? In four years? Is there any evidence that he treated citizens of the majority community with genuine respect in his dealings with them? Those are the things that reveal true character, and the absence of evidence is damning.

The simple fact is that it was Wilson's actions, and Wilson's actions alone, have brought this necessary investigation upon the system of justice in Ferguson and St. Louis County.

And there could be some truth to that, I'm not disputing that. Equally it was Brown's actions that resulted in his own death.

The simple fact is that it was not Wilson vs. Brown as much as it was Wilson vs. the community he was supposed to be serving.

No, it was first and foremost Brown vs. officer Wilson. All Brown had to do was follow the officers instruction and trying to be some badass. If the cop tells you something, do it. If he would have done that and NOT snag the cigars, he'd still be among us.

Most people with a shred of decency can sympathize with a neighborhood that had to witness (and possibly fall victim to) a police officer running amok and unloading his weapon and killing a young man in broad daylight

The same can be said for the police that on a daily basis risk their lives for the community.

shooting him twice in the head and then having him left out in the middle of the street for many hours. All on a Saturday, starting shortly after the noon hour.

If Brown was charging the police officer and he felt the need to use force, which you are trained to stop any assailant trying to inflict physical harm, then he was justified in using that force if that is what happened, but as of yet, we do not know all the facts.

Anyone claiming moral values derived from Judeo-Christian roots -- even those which call for an "eye for an eye" -- a death sentence is not warranted for someone who jaywalks, steals cigars, or even strikes a person (unless the blow is mortally serious).

That depends, we are not talking about vigilante justice, you weren't there, you don't know what and how it happened and what was in Wilson's head. If he acted with malice or if he felt it was the only conclusion to stopa gargantuan kid trying to pummel your face in.

In that sense, people with any decency should be able to feel concern about a victim executed the way multiple eyewitnesses claim that Brown was. It would be a perversion of justice in the very highest sense to assert that a death penalty was warranted, or to assert that the killer should escape justice himself.

Claim is NOT a necessary FACT. Opening up the possibility that the facts are completely different of what you might think. But what I fear is that Holder will turn this (it technically already is) into a racial issue. If the facts come out that Wilson was justified in this shooting, people like you and the rest of the Blacks and Sharpton will still cry calling for justice when the investigation was concluded, I am saying, IF. The Black community will not stand for anything else, other than seeing officer Wilson swing from a noose. I have never seen Holder in almost 6 years move so swiftly and use his power to get to the bottom of justice. Because a Black kid gets shoot (possibly justified at that, we don't know yet) he gets off his butt. Anything else, this guy is slower than molasses on a cold Winters day.

It's called a consensus opinion. Just as witnesses here can assert that you have absolutely no respect whatsoever for the Black Community of Ferguson, having called them "out-of-control" (read: deserving to die) and "rioters" and "looters." It is easy to understand why you sympathize with a killer.

I sympathize with anyone that doesn't get their day in court and when there is a lynch mob trying to hang a person without a trial. We are the US and everyone has a right to stand and face the justice system, fairly under the law. I want that for EVERY American and I will not make any judgment until all the facts come out.

In four years serving that community, can Wilson even get one African-American community leader to say a word on his behalf? To which you replied

I believe most who read you can perceive what you think you know. And why you didn't care to write out that "knowledge," as it would be yet another in a string of racist remarks.

I see, but your remarks were not?? Of course, most Blacks have turned it into a racial incident, if Wilson were Black, this would NEVER have gotten the medias attention, and you wouldn't have seen the majority of the protesters which were Black protesting, everyone knows that. So who is the racist?

Four years in serving the community and not one letter or piece of evidence of anything positive Wilson did for the majority community in Ferguson? In four years?

Many officers don't get that, many people don't give a rats ass what the cop does for the community, it's often a thankless job, my brother is a cop, so I know. That has nothing to do with color, but more about ethics and moral values.

Is there any evidence that he treated citizens of the majority community with genuine respect in his dealings with them? Those are the things that reveal true character, and the absence of evidence is damning.

Again, you are digging deep again, Yabits? We will just have to wait for the all the facts to come out and then we can give the verdict as to what Wilson's real true conduct was.

I sympathize with anyone that doesn't get their day in court and when there is a lynch mob trying to hang a person without a trial. We are the US and everyone has a right to stand and face the justice system, fairly under the law. I want that for EVERY American and I will not make any judgment until all the facts come out.

That all sounds very fine and good and by the book, but it doesn't explain how in the same post you can still write -

it was Brown's actions that resulted in his own death.

Even though you weren't there, you don't know the facts that you insist others must know before they make any comment about Wilson's culpability, you know enough to state categorically that Brown deserved to die?

All Brown had to do was follow the officers instruction and trying to be some badass. If the cop tells you something, do it.

You know, I'm a law-abiding person, I respect the police and normally I would agree with you 100% on this point. But if I were walking down the street and some person in a uniform came effing and blinding at me, I think my first reaction would be to remonstrate, not to meekly say 'Yes, sir' and obey. I don't pay taxes to be sworn at by public servants.

a Black kid gets shoot (possibly justified at that, we don't know yet)

We do know. No police officer is justified in shooting to death any person who is not in the act of actively threatening or imposing serious physical harm or worse on another human being. Brown was some distance from Wilson, threatening no member of the public; for Wilson to legitimately feel personal danger he would have to wait until Brown was much closer, assuming (despite what the witnesses say) that Brown was in fact 'charging' at the officer.

That all sounds very fine and good and by the BOOK, but it doesn't explain how in the same post you can still write-

it was Brown's actions that resulted in his own death.

Which was true, but that doesn't mean, I am ecstatic that the kid is dead.

Even though you weren't there, you don't know the facts that you insist others must know before they make any comment about Wilson's culpability, you know enough to state categorically that Brown deserved to die?

No, I never said the kid deserved to die. I said, Brown was responsible for his own death. Also I never said, I know the facts, none of us do. NONE of us. We are still waiting for all the facts to come out.

You know, I'm a law-abiding person, I respect the police and normally I would agree with you 100% on this point. But if I were walking down the street and some person in a uniform came effing and blinding at me, I think my first reaction would be to remonstrate, not to meekly say 'Yes, sir' and obey. I don't pay taxes to be sworn at by public servants.

I agree. But all I am saying, being equally belligerent with a cop will achieve nothing. You will always lose. I have been in a situation before where a cop was acting like a jerk talking down to me. I followed his instructions, jotted down his info and filed a formal complaint, it was taken seriously, the officer did get into some hot water and I received and official policy. All I am saying, there is a time and place for everything.

We do know. No police officer is justified in shooting to death any person who is not in the act of actively threatening or imposing serious physical harm or worse on another human being.

With all due respect, a police officer has every right to use justifiable force, which is to stop ANY aggressor, which can mean shoot to kill if it means, the officers life was in serious peril or to intervene in saving another persons life. This is why a police officer has a license to kill and that is why they carry a gun, it is not a toy and it is used in self-defense or if the officer is in a very dangerous situation.

Brown was some distance from Wilson,

That is ONE side of the argument.

threatening no member of the public; for Wilson to legitimately feel personal danger he would have to wait until Brown was much closer, assuming (despite what the witnesses say) that Brown was in fact 'charging' at the officer.

Cleo, you and I don't know that. I remember a few times when the public said one thing and when the facts came out, a lot of people felt stupid. Susan Smith, the Duke Lacrosse, OJ and many others where the public got it wrong. So I will wait before I make up my own mind.

Many officers don't get that, many people don't give a rats ass what the cop does for the community, it's often a thankless job, my brother is a cop, so I know.

Your brother is a cop, so you think you know.

The fact that many people do not give a care does not nullify the fact that a great many people do care. Truly good police know how to build relationships and alliances with the people who care. If Wilson had made any effort in four years to do that, there would have been evidence of it by now. There was a very good reason he was not asked to stay at Jennings -- a community desperate to keep good cops.

But what I fear is that Holder will turn this (it technically already is) into a racial issue. If the facts come out that Wilson was justified in this shooting, people like you and the rest of the Blacks and Sharpton will still cry calling for justice when the investigation was concluded,

Readers of this thread can verify that it is people like you who have and continue to make it a racial issue.

The Black community will not stand for anything else, other than seeing officer Wilson swing from a noose.

On behalf of the hundreds of innocent African-Americans who were summarily lynched by whites, and despite the fact that no white person was ever lynched by a Black group in that manner, your rhetoric is extremely vile and racist. Yet again, it betrays your extreme fear and loathing of black people in general.

if Wilson were Black, this would NEVER have gotten the medias attention

What most people know is that if Wilson were a black officer, he would not have handled the situation the same way that the white Wilson did. If one of the three black officers in the Ferguson force did discharge their weapons in the way Wilson did, they would not have been as insulated and protected from Day One as the white officer was. (Does anyone seriously believe the Ferguson police would have waited a week to have released his identity?) The community could have expected to receive a detailed incident report in a timely manner.

As a matter of fact, when the incident first occurred, there were white supremacists here trying to plant the story that it was a black officer who shot Brown. They are the same ones who are planting the "shattered eye socket" story and that Brown was going for Wilson's gun -- when no eyewitness accounts have him in the car at all -- but trying to get away from it.

Claim is NOT a necessary FACT. Opening up the possibility that the facts are completely different of what you might think.... or if he felt it was the only conclusion to stopa gargantuan kid trying to pummel your face in.

One can't have four to five independent eyewitnesses say "green" and then pretend some imaginary event will arise that makes it all red. The video evidence shows an obviously healthy and physically able Officer Wilson pacing around the body of the young man he murdered. The body is lying 30 or more feet from the police car. It is as self-evident as the convenience store video. Wilson's face is clearly "unpummeled"

Because of St. Louis County being under investigation, I don't have a lot of faith they will weigh the facts of this case fairly. Why should anyone have faith in them? But I will make this prediction: If the grand jury brings charges against Wilson, the white supremacists will not accept it, but will start to look for reasons to blame Attorney General Holder and President Obama for the results. You have already tipped your hand on that.

"I remember a few times when the public said one thing and when the facts came out, a lot of people felt stupid. Susan Smith, the Duke Lacrosse, OJ and many others where the public got it wrong. So I will wait before I make up my own mind."

Amen, brother! You nailed it.

A rush to jugment is too reactionary and not the way to go in any criminal case where a man's life is on the line and he might be going to prison for the rest of his life. He at least deserves a fair trial, not a public lynching.

A fair trial is not just for the accused but for the victim's family as well, and that's why I'll stand by what the FBI investigation uncovers either way. And their investigation is far from over.

I'm still waiting to see what, if any, DNA traces are on the officer's weapon and holster. It there aren't any DNA traces, then I'll begin to have serious doubts & questions about the officer's deadly reaction. BTW, like it or not, according to Missouri state law, if there are any traces of a perpetrator's DNA / fingerprints on a police officer's weapon, then it won't matter if Brown was standing on his head and singin' Dixie at the time he was shot.

Skin color? Racism? Nope. Just Missouri's state laws and probably some Blue Laws in between which nobody has ever heard of that date back to before the Civil War.

Not sayin' it's right, but that's the way they play ball over there.

I never said the kid deserved to die. I said, Brown was responsible for his own death.

Deserved to die vs responsible for his own death = semantics. You're playing with words. Whichever way you spin it, you're saying that Brown died because of his own actions, not because a police officer pulled out a gun and shot him multiple times.

Also I never said, I know the facts

Then how can you say with such certainty that the boy's actions were what caused his death, if you don't know what those actions were?

a police officer has every right to use justifiable force, which is to stop ANY aggressor, which can mean shoot to kill if it means, the officers life was in serious peril or to intervene in saving another persons life

You don't know the facts. There is no reason, from the evidence out there, to suppose that Wilson was justified in shooting an unarmed youth at a distance. As far as we know (and the Ferguson police have not been forward in producing any evidence to the contrary) there is no evidence that the officer's life was in any danger or that he needed to intervene to save any other person's life. For a police officer to be issued a gun is not a 'license to kill', it is a huge responsibility; he is being trusted to use the gun only when necessary to protect innocent life, not as a means of culling what he might consider to be the local riff-raff.

it was Brown's actions that resulted in his own death. I said, Brown was responsible for his own death.

For either of these to be true, Brown would have had to have committed an offense that would be reasonable to react to by shooting and killing of a suspect.

Let's go down the list:

Jaywalking: No, it is not reasonable to react by shooting and killing the suspect.

Not listening to a police officer: No, it is not reasonable to react by shooting and killing the suspect.

So, based on the evidence, what offense do you think Brown committed that it would be reasonable to react to by shooting and killing him?

Arresting? Maybe. Shooting and killing? I am not convinced.

You're playing with words. Whichever way you spin it, you're saying that Brown died because of his own actions, not because a police officer pulled out a gun and shot him multiple times.

Put another way, for any cop who shoots a citizen without justification, the citizen can be said to have died due to their own actions, according to bass4funk.

So, based on the evidence, what offense do you think Brown committed that it would be reasonable to react to by shooting and killing him?

As recently reported in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, two more eyewitnesses have come forward to give testimony, and one of them spoke to the paper on the condition of anonymity. (These eyewitnesses, according to the paper, are white construction workers who were working on one of the apartments.) Their accounts closely resemble the others, especially in the key detail of whether Brown tried to rush the officer: (He did not.) So, to this point we're around six or seven independent eyewitnesses -- and none of them have it that Brown rushed at the police officer.

you and I don't know that.

This has been frequently asserted and every time I see it, it reminds me of the cone of silence in the old Get Smart comedy -- only in this case, the poster claiming to know nothing is donning the cone of ignorance. When seven eyewitnesses claim that they did not witness Brown rushing at the officer, and there's not a single independent eyewitness who claims that Brown rushed, that's what is known as the mounting of evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.

Others have mentioned irrelevant cases on the basis of what they claim was a "rush to judgment" -- wrongly. How I think this case will turn out is like the one where a former San Francisco councilman took a gun and murdered the mayor and other city leader in cold blood -- about as premeditated as a crime can be -- and then was found "not guilty" of the crime due to diminished mental capacity via eating junk food. There was something akin to race-hatred -- fear and loathing -- at the foundation of that case.

@zichi

How do you connect the shooting of Brown the cigars because the officer Wilson knew nothing about thAt when he killed Brown? Personally I would assume that an officer is not going to fire at me unless I'm running away from a crime or I'm armed myself. Brown wasn't doing that?

Or if he was charging the officer which Dr. Baden said, it cannot be ruled out.

We don't know all the facts but in all your comments you have claimed to know the facts about everything.

No, I don't and yet, you guys seem as if you do. Why because you feel it sutpports your skewed narrative of what you would LIKE the facts to be and NOT as they MIGHT be?

The store owner has said it wasn't Brown and he has not complained to the police that a theft had happened, in fact, he didn't even phone the police another person in the shop did that and we haven't seen any police witness reports on what happened in the store.

Yeah, right, so that means! Brown has a twin and OJ is still looking for the killers. Zichi, you are a funny guy.

We haven't seen any police incident report. You want a fair trial for officer Wilson but thousands of times you have condemned Brown without any trial and based your poor conclusions from a poor quality shop video shown by the likes of YouTube.

I didn't condemn Brown of anything, I merely stated that what was established and that Brown was thuggin his way through the store, ripping off a box of cigars, been saying that all along.

The Ferguson chief police said officer Wilson was injured by Brown which required hospital treatment but no released photo's or for that matter medical reports about the Wilson injuries? The police still haven't released the police report about the shooting even though its almost one month since Brown was killed.

Been through that, already told you, I agree with you on that point.

Equally, that applies to you and your many comments?

Which I have been consistent.

I have never said nor believe that Brown was shot and killed by officer Wilson because he was black, although non of us can know what would have happened if Brown had been white instead of Black. But clearly, there are major problems between the Ferguson police dept and the Black community. The investigation needs to review those problems and come up with possible answers.

I agree and racism goes both ways.

One officer called the Black protestors "animals", but according to you he was also fired? There are issues like the second largest revenue is from fines issued to citizens for non violent crimes. Which can of city authority does that?

Because CNN and other media outlets confirmed the officer was fired and rightfully so.

Going by your numerous comments on the events in Ferguson, that's just what you did with Michael Brown. You have been judge, jury and executioner and even assumed him of being a thug who deserved to die for his actions.

No, but you, Yabits and other libs have been judge, jury and executioner when it comes to the guilt or innocence of officer Wilson

You should at least given all parties a fair hearing instead of only calling for a one sided one in favor of the police.

Same to you

The majority of Black citizens in Ferguson did not take part in the protests nor did they riot and loot. You have condemned the whole of the Black community for doing that, when in fact(s) they didn't?

I personally didn't condemn the Black community of anything, you are now lying and putting out false statements. I just only brought known statistical facts.

I personally didn't condemn the Black community of anything, you are now lying and putting out false statements.

Objection. Accusing someone of "lying" and putting out "false statements" is yet another of your personal condemnations. Anyone reading this thread can see where you claimed the black community of Ferguson was "out of control" as well as their taking part in rioting in looting -- when the simple truth is the vast majority of the black community did not either riot or loot.

Or if he was charging the officer which Dr. Baden said, it cannot be ruled out.

Dr. Baden's is just one piece of evidence. He said the head was bent forward, which can be suggestive of a lot of things none of which Dr. Baden could say for certain. If Dr. Baden, being a normal intelligent human being, was presented with reports of seven eyewitnesses who claim that Brown was bent over and heading towards his hands and knees, and zero eyewitnesses claiming that Brown was charging, Dr. Baden would then rule out charging.

In other words, whether Brown charged or not is not up to what Dr. Baden says, but what the eyewitnesses who were on the scene have to say. That is every bit as important evidence as Dr. Baden's findings -- but you have not given that evidence much importance at all.

Why because you feel it sutpports your skewed narrative of what you would LIKE the facts to be..

To discount or ignore seven eyewitnesses who are consistent in reporting that Brown did not charge is the real skewing of narrative here. To pretend that Brown might have charged, when not a single eyewitness supports that, and use what Dr. Baden said as the reason -- knowing full well Dr. Baden was not at the scene, while the eyewitnesses were -- that is skewing the narrative.

No, but you, Yabits and other libs have been judge, jury and executioner when it comes to the guilt or innocence of officer Wilson

You have asserted on several occasions that you think the police have a "license to kill." A license to kill means the right to kill with impunity and not have to answer for it. By using that term, that is what you believe, and how you have behaved. A cop who is granted a license to kill becomes judge, jury and executioner -- and that's what you grant them when you claim -- multiple times -- that they have that license.

And this is how you pervert the truth even more: By demanding that Wilson answer to a court of law, that is what you are calling "judge, jury, and executioner." The citizens of the community correctly perceive that there is probable cause for charges to be filed against Wilson. That is what most of us who you are calling "libs" believe to. We want Wilson to explain his actions in a court of law. We are dealing with the killing of a human being. And not by someone who has a "license to kill," but someone who has been given a very high responsibility and must answer for it.

But the way the laws in that particular state are skewed, charges may never be filed against Wilson, despite all the evidence.

@yabits

Your brother is a cop, so you think you know.

I do. Many of my closest friends are cops. Also, my parents live in an area where many cops live. I have been on ride alongs, police events, picnics, reported on a few homicides, been in gang units, reporting, funerals etc. as a family member, reporter and so yes, I do know cops and how they operate.

The fact that many people do not give a care does not nullify the fact that a great many people do care. Truly good police know how to build relationships and alliances with the people who care.

I agree.

If Wilson had made any effort in four years to do that, there would have been evidence of it by now. There was a very good reason he was not asked to stay at Jennings -- a community desperate to keep good cops.

There could've been many reasons, but we don't know.

Readers of this thread can verify that it is people like you who have and continue to make it a racial issue.

Sorry, but I'm not the one that constantly talks about race in the context of the White man is out to get the Black man, I don't care about color, but it's funny how you and zichi try so desperately to make it seem like I'm color obsessed. I care about there was a law that was broken and a kid that was killed, the color of his skin had nothing to do with it, but his attitude did, then everyone started throwing in that Wilson had a thing against Blacks. I merely brought up the statistics about Black Communities across the US, that's it, but nice try, Yabits.

On behalf of the hundreds of innocent African-Americans who were summarily lynched by whites, and despite the fact that no white person was ever lynched by a Black group in that manner, your rhetoric is extremely vile and racist.

So what do you call the "knockout game?" Where most of the victims were White? Racist, or maybe mistaken identity? There have been a lot of violence that Blacks have committed against Whites, some of them racial and some were not. I know, you don't want to belive there is any truth in it? So once again, you want to dismiss the facts. Yes, Whites are the devils always and Blacks are the victims, always. That's what you want to hear, right? Don't even make it as if Blacks would never or don't have it inside them To hurt or harm another person based on their skin tone you are wrong and I find it also insulting that you think Blacks are incapable of committing any crimes against Whites. Yabits, just stop.....

Yet again, it betrays your extreme fear and loathing of black people in general.

Believe me when I tell you, there is no way I hate Black people. Not at all.

What most people know is that if Wilson were a black officer, he would not have handled the situation the same way that the white Wilson did.

So now you have the insight and knowledge of how every Black person thinks and how he/she would do their job? Seriously????

If one of the three black officers in the Ferguson force did discharge their weapons in the way Wilson did, they would not have been as insulated and protected from Day One as the white officer was. (Does anyone seriously believe the Ferguson police would have waited a week to have released his identity?) The community could have expected to receive a detailed incident report in a timely manner.

Racist statement, gross and false accusation? Of course NOT.

Put another way, for any cop who shoots a citizen without justification, the citizen can be said to have died due to their own actions, according to bass4funk.

No! Once again, you got it wrong. We don't have all the facts, so we don't know if it was a justifiable shooting. Therefore, if officer Wilson shot Brown because brown was getting ready to hurt the officer or the officer felt his life was in danger because if his version of the story is true and he got the crap beaten out of him, then he had every right to use deadly to stop the agrresor if that is indeed what happened and he was getting ready to assault officer Wilson again. But that's just one scenario.

@zichi

Maybe you have forgotten what you commented on this post.

Nope, didn't forget, dude.

"And yes, sadly the Black community is out of control, Black on Black crime is the leading cause of Black deaths. I wonder if Sharpton or Holder will speak about that?"

In many areas, like Chicago where the crime, murder and shooting that is done mostly by blacks towards other Blacks is indeed out of control.

"In all the urban cities, they are."

Go to most of the Urban cities in American and you will see what I am talking about.

"The issue is, why did most of the Blacks in Ferguson riot and loot?"

Again? We went over that. I'm not doing this again with you, moving on.

->"The police are NOT the only ones that can't' trusted! But Brown and his thuggish friends can be? "

I never said that! Of course the officer could be out of line, we don't know that, but what we do know for a fact is that Brown was a thug, gentle giant? I beg to differ, but if the shooting was justifiable, not known yet. Still waiting for the facts to come out.

@zichi

Sorry, but once again, allow me to clarify, since you think for some reason that I don't recall what I said.

1) I don't believe all cops are bad, but you do have some bad jerks out there, some might be belligerent and racist, but 99% are not. The majority of cops are honorable and hardworking people that put their lives on the line everyday for us and they have to deal and tolerate on a daily basis, including false accusations of police conduct.

2) No matter how you want to try and make Brown look, if you ask me, if he deserved to have died for stealing the cigars, I would say, NO. However, Brown was probably not that smart (meaning streetwise) his actions brought forth his demise. He made some bad choices and one was stealing something that didn't belong to him and for what? To smoke blunts?? He used his size to intimidate the store clerk, he pushed him out of the way and proceeded to exit the store without making a purchase and third, decides to go toe to toe with a cop. Bad move and as such, the altercation escalated and now we have one kid that thuggee his way and thought he was so tough, no one could tell him what to do.

This will hopefully teach any thug, if the cop tells you something, just do it and it'll be over soon and you will be on your way, but fighting with a cop, you will never win as Brown did find out the hard way

Just what law was broken? Jaywalking, is that a crime were people are shot and killed?

No, but it's still a crime, regardless in California, the cops are very strict about Jaywalking, most states are, some are more than others.

However, Brown was probably not that smart (meaning streetwise) his actions brought forth his demise.

I have not seen any evidence that would lead me to believe any of Brown's actions warranted being shot numerous times and killed.

He made some bad choices and one was stealing something that didn't belong to him and for what?

This is not a crime which alone is punishable by death or which warrants being shot and killed.

He used his size to intimidate the store clerk, he pushed him out of the way and proceeded to exit the store without making a purchase and third,

This is not a crime which alone is punishable by death or which warrants being shot and killed.

decides to go toe to toe with a cop.

What is the evidence that Brown went toe to toe with a police officer?

Bad move and as such, the altercation escalated and now we have one kid that thuggee his way and thought he was so tough, no one could tell him what to do.

This is not a crime which alone is punishable by death or which warrants being shot and killed.

regardless in California, the cops are very strict about Jaywalking, most states are, some are more than others.

In this case, it truly seems that the police officers was unreasonably 'strict'. Jaywalking should never warrant being shot numerous times and being killed.

I have not seen any evidence that would lead me to believe any of Brown's actions warranted being shot numerous times and killed.

We don't know why he was shot numerous times, there could be a couple of reasons as to why he did. That hasn't been determined yet.

This is not a crime which alone is punishable by death or which warrants being shot and killed.

But nonetheless it's still a crime.

What is the evidence that Brown went toe to toe with a police officer?

It is a guess ONLY from one POV of evidence, just like for some that say, Wilson without a doubt intended to murder Brown.

In this case, it truly seems that the police officers was unreasonably 'strict'. Jaywalking should never warrant being shot numerous times and being killed.

It shouldn't, but when a person gets involved with the police and starts an altercation either physically or verbally, depending on the situation and how it escalates, anything can happen and nothing should be ruled out.

The key evidence, in my opinion, is going to boil down to what happened at the onset of the confrontation between Brown and the police officer.

Did Brown forcibly enter (even if via the window) the officer's vehicle, or was he pulled into it by the officer?

Did Brown physically assault the officer?

Did Brown make an attempt to grab the officer's gun?

Did the officer's gun really go off in the car? If yes, how and why did the gun go off and whose hand was on the gun when it did go off?

I haven't heard any clear answers to these questions and I can't believe anything Johnson claims to be the truth because he has a criminal record and a history of lying.

Until documentation or the investigation can SHOW otherwise the only minor crime Michael Brown was committing in the street was jaywalking and the fact that officer Wilson shot Brown six times seems like an extensive number in defending himself, if in fact, he was defending himself.

You forgot the cigars he stole, main point. That's like me saying, Wilson DIDN'T shoot Brown.

Wilson fired his gun more than seven times because the police removed a bullet from a building next to the place where Brown died. Fortunate that no one else was killed if Wilson was firing so wildly? The tragic story is that a young teenage was shoot death, don't which of the bullets killed him, probably the one to the head.

Yes and a bullet has not name, so the facts will come out soon enough. But he probably had a valid reason for using excessive force, but who knows, we don't.

Its one month since Brown was killed and just the Ferguson police dept haven't released the police reports on the store and the killing of Michael Brown.

I agree with you, that is odd and not to mention, we need to hear Wilson's side of the story.

The key evidence, in my opinion, is going to boil down to what happened at the onset of the confrontation between Brown and the police officer.

No. First of all, the grand jury will, in all likelihood, not hear from Wilson. Not unless they call him to testify, and even then he may plead the fifth.

The more seconds that passed from the initial confrontation at the car to when Brown was shot will make the initial confrontation have less importance. For example, at the moment Wilson left his vehicle to pursue Brown, was his life in immediate danger? If the answer is "No," then what happened prior his leaving the car has less relevance.

I haven't heard any clear answers to these questions and I can't believe anything Johnson claims to be the truth because he has a criminal record and a history of lying.

The two most recent independent eyewitnesses -- two construction workers who happen to be white -- heard the first shot and witnessed the ensuing events as they unfolded. Their testimony closely matches Johnson's once Wilson left the vehicle -- especially Brown's final moments when both adamantly assert that Brown was not rushing the officer, but just barely moving towards him with hands raised to give himself up. One related hearing Brown saying: "OK, OK, OK, OK...as he was being shot." Both have said the police officer said or yelled nothing to Brown: just kept shooting as Brown started to stumble towards the ground.

Some of the right-wing sites have been doing their best to try and undermine the "surrender" story, but these two latest eyewitnesses reveal their efforts to be nothing more than a tacit racial smear on the residents of the community.

In an unusual move, the St. Louis County grand jury is being given access to all of the evidence and is being able to hear the eyewitness testimony as soon as it comes available. (Usually they would wait until the ongoing investigations are completed.) From what I am reading, those investigations are in their final stages.

Wilson fired his gun more than seven times

Wilson's gun held 12 rounds --- standard for the Ferguson force for that type of weapon. He missed six times. The final two shots were to Brown's head, from a distance of about 15 feet or so, after Brown had already been hit four times. No eyewitness recounts any move by Brown to rush the officer.

". . . two construction workers who happened to be white - heard the first shot and witnessed the ensuing events as they unfolded."

That's just it. The first shot was supposed to have gone off inside of the officer's vehicle, so the construction workers didn't see what happened up to that point. I would like to know what happened just prior to the first shot going off.

The questions I presented are related to the events leading up to the first shot going off, which I assume took place inside of the police officer's vehicle.

What happened at the very beginning of the encounter just prior to the first shot going off? And then there is the forensic evidence, which is all critically important but unknown to the public at this point in time.

@yabits

No. First of all, the grand jury will, in all likelihood, not hear from Wilson. Not unless they call him to testify, and even then he may plead the fifth.

Which he his the right to invoke if he so wishes to. That doesn't establish either if he's guilty or innocent of any wrongdoing.

The more seconds that passed from the initial confrontation at the car to when Brown was shot will make the initial confrontation have less importance. For example, at the moment Wilson left his vehicle to pursue Brown, was his life in immediate danger? If the answer is "No," then what happened prior his leaving the car has less relevance.

Good question, this is why there is an investigation, there is nothing we can rule out.

especially Brown's final moments when both adamantly assert that Brown was not rushing the officer, but just barely moving towards him with hands raised to give himself up. One related hearing Brown saying: "OK, OK, OK, OK...as he was being shot." Both have said the police officer said or yelled nothing to Brown: just kept shooting as Brown started to stumble towards the ground.

There were also witnesses that said the opposite that Brown bum rushed the officer, either way, I am not taking either side until the investigation is complete. There were already some eyewitnesses that were dismissed for lack of credibility, then that means there are some holes that need to be scrutinized.

Some of the right-wing sites have been doing their best to try and undermine the "surrender" story, but these two latest eyewitnesses reveal their efforts to be nothing more than a tacit racial smear on the residents of the community.

And some of the Left-wing sites paint Brown as some gently innocent giant and the facts are showing otherwise.

In an unusual move, the St. Louis County grand jury is being given access to all of the evidence and is being able to hear the eyewitness testimony as soon as it comes available. (Usually they would wait until the ongoing investigations are completed.) From what I am reading, those investigations are in their final stages.

Good, hopefully we will finally know the truth as to what happened.

Wilson's gun held 12 rounds --- standard for the Ferguson force for that type of weapon. He missed six times. The final two shots were to Brown's head, from a distance of about 15 feet or so, after Brown had already been hit four times. No eyewitness recounts any move by Brown to rush the officer.

That is one version. But when you shoot a big guy like that, sometimes 1 or 2 won't even slow a person down. Take Suge Knight, he got shot 6 times last week and not only did he survive, he walked into the hospital by himself and I met Suge 12 years ago, that is a very big guy, Brown is almost has the same dimensions, so it is highly possible that Officer Wilson needed to shoot multiple times in order to stop a raging Brown.

@zichi

I didn't forget the accusation that Brown stole from the store but the owner didn't make a complaint to the police.

So what? That doesn't mean it didn't happen. Jeez, you really don't understand the streets. The owner might be scared to say something out of fear of retaliation which is a very high possibility, there was NO audio and we don't know if the store was hit on previous occasions where the owner was threatened, we don't know that, but as the old saying Snitchin' leaves you in stitches there is a strict code that I grew up with in my neighborhood, you don't snitch, you don't rat and you don't talk to the cops! For most people it is understood you see something, keep your mouth shut. Even Suge Knight, shot 6 times, he was standing next to Chris Brown, lucky he didn't get hit, hundreds of witnesses and the cops can't get anyone to talk, not even Knight who basically said, he wasn't even aware he was shot, acting all delusional and disoriented. That could be a very real serious reason as to why the store owner said what he said.

Also, officer Darren Wilson didn't know about any store at the time of the shooting and killing of the teenager, Michael Brown. That's the main point, why was Brown killed and not what happened in the store.

No, you don't know what evidence the feds have in their possession. There could be a very, very high possibility that Wilson DID hear of the robbery.

You seem unable to accept the facts of the case and the cause for the investigation?

I think it's the other way around, you and Yabits want to convict a man without allowing the justice system to make its case, I have always, always been consistent and said that the feds need to complete and conclude their investigation with all the facts and before we can make any judgement, we need to see the facts. Sorry zichi, but I can accept all the facts and there are a lot more that we don't know that supports either side of the argument and we all need to be fair. I am, so should you guys.

That's just it.

The important thing is that the two latest eyewitnesses tell stories that match up very closely to what Johnson told. (As well as the other eyewitnesses.)

which I assume took place inside of the police officer's vehicle.

Not inside. At the vehicle. No witness places Brown inside the vehicle at any time. DNA, or lack thereof, on gun or holster will undermine (or support) their claims.

Ms. Mitchell was in a car that was 10 feet from the officer's car when the tussle started. Her attention was first called when she heard the brakes as Wilson reversed and quickly stopped his vehicle. She witnessed the tussle, although from the passenger side of Wilson's vehicle. From that angle, she was able to see that Brown's head was outside the vehicle and that he kept trying to pull away, while the officer kept trying to hold him closer. (That also matches Johnson's version.)

It was during that tussle that Johnson says he heard Wilson say, "I'll shoot," followed very soon by a single shot. It may have very well been a shot that hit Brown before he finally pulled away and started to run. (Johnson claims that first shot drew blood.) Soon after, a second shot was fired, probably again from the vehicle. But Brown and Johnson were already on the run.

The entire incident probably took between 90 seconds to 2 minutes. Less than two minutes for a police officer to allow a situation involving two jaywalkers to get completely out of control

The important thing is that the two latest eyewitnesses tell stories that match up very closely to what Johnson told. (As well as the other eyewitnesses.)

That's your assessment of the situation. You are NOT the prosecutor, you cannot define what will be admitted and what will be tossed out. You are NOT the deciding factor except for public opinion. Which means nothing to the case.

The entire incident probably took between 90 seconds to 2 minutes. Less than two minutes for a police officer to allow a situation involving two jaywalkers to get completely out of control

Maybe, maybe not.

@zichi

Nope! I have asked questions why Michael Brown was shot six times and killed and why Darren Wilson sot at least seven bullets from his 12 bullet gun. I have also asked if he shot Brown when he surrendered and again when he hit the road but I haven't made a single comment about Darren Wilson being guilty of anything.

Zichi, all of your posts are pointing towards and assuming that Wilson is guilty. NOT once did you play Devil's advocate and lean on the possibility that perhaps Brown wasn't the Saint that people in his community make him out to be.

Unlike, who even since the first posts on the killing of Michael Brown found him guilty on all accounts and said he was responsible for his own death even without you being present at the scene or knowing all the facts?

Which he totally was. There is NO disputing that.

all of your posts are pointing towards and assuming that Wilson is guilty. NOT once did you play Devil's advocate and lean on the possibility that perhaps Brown wasn't the Saint that people in his community make him out to be

You mean all of us who aren't saints can expect to be gunned down by the police if we have the temerity to walk the streets of the US?

Are you a saint, bass? Are your children saints? Would you be happy to have them gunned down by an out-of-control police officer on account of their lack of anointed sainthood? Would you shrug and say they brought it on themselves? Or would it be different if it were your kids?

bass

Which he totally was. There is NO disputing that.

So Michael Brown was totally responsible for his own death. Because?

Because he had a long record of being a 'thug'? Brown had no criminal record.

Because he stole some cigars? Wilson did not know about that, and even if he did, it doesn't warrant shooting an unarmed man for it.

Because he was jaywalking? Not a reason to shoot somebody.

Because he threatened Wilson? We don't know about that, but Brown was shot a considerable distance from the patrol car, most likely with his hands in the air.

I don't see any way you can claim Brown was responsible for his own death, unless being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong skin color (or, as you put it, being a member of the "out of control" nationwide black community), and in the presence of a trigger-happy cop count as just asking to get shot.

Darren Wilson never called in the shooting. He never went to check the condition of Michael Brown after he was down. He (or any other cops) never called an ambulance. He has yet to make a statement. You'd think that a cop who was clearly acting in self defense would have done all these things. If Michael Brown was just asking for it, you'd think Darren Wilson's post-incident actions would have been very different.

And why did the Ferguson police leave the body in the middle of the street for four hours?

This is a very fishy case, and you're out of line blaming the victim. Cigars, thugs, and 'black on black' crime are irrelevant.

@cleo

You mean all of us who aren't saints can expect to be gunned down by the police if we have the temerity to walk the streets of the US?

I'm not even going to address that ludicrous statement.

I'll say this though, I walk almost anywhere and never had to worry about the police. When I deal with the police, I am always professional in my behavior. Doesn't matter what color you are. As long as you abide by the law and if and when you are confronted with a cop, just follow what he says and you will be on your way.

Are you a saint, bass?

Far from it, but I'm not stupid either.

Are your children saints? Would you be happy to have them gunned down by an out-of-control police officer on account of their lack of anointed sainthood? Would you shrug and say they brought it on themselves? Or would it be different if it were your kids?

No and my kids would never be in that situation, hopefully. I have raised my kids to always respect the law of authority.

1) If the cop asks you to do something do it.

2) If the officer tells you to be quiet, do so. Arguing with a cop will get you NO Where, but possibly more trouble.

3) Don't curse, don't make excuses, don't challenge the officer, especially if he/she is in a bad mood.

4) Walk up, get in an officers face, touch him/her.

My kids know this, they follow the rules, they have never had a problem, nor have I. Most Blacks like Rap, R&B and Hip Hop (not only Blacks, but we are talking about them), if you listen to Rap music a lot of it has condemnation for the cops, music is a tool to reach out to the masses, highly influential and some kids think they can just talk to a cop any way they like and I have seen a dozen situations turn out worse for the accuser. So good advice, don't do it. Because cops are humans, they have bad days like anyone else and some cops are jerks and you don't want to push the jerk cops around and give them a reason to do anything. If you have a gripe with a particular peace officer, get their name and badge number and file a police complaint. I have done it before and I got the results that I wanted. It's just that simple.

If something God forbid were to happen to my kids, I would allow the system to take its course. I mean, what else can you do? What's done is done, you can't become a vigilante. I have always believed and trusted in the system.

@zichi

We have an event which led to the death of a teenager, Michael Brown who didn't have any previous criminal record

Technically, now he does.

and had just graduated from school age 18 and was about to go on with further education who was stopped shot at least six times when he was jaywalking in a quite street, which you can view on Google Earth.

Then he shouldn't have been stealing cigars! If you don't have the money, don't think you can take what you want! You are not above the law and you are NOT invincible! As if Brown graduating from HS and going off to further your education makes ANY difference. Now you are implying University students are immune to any kind of prosecution because they are trying to further their education?

The officer Darren Wilson was an experienced officer so just why did he feel so threatened by unarmed Michael Brown which made him empty his gun?

Dunno, if a guy as big as the Hulk was trying to muscle me, I would do EVERYTHING in my power to neutralize that threat until that threat was diminished.

And you continue to state, even without the benefit of a fair trial or hearing find Michael Brown guilty of all accounts which amounts to nothing more than a lynch mob mentality?

He is guilty of altering the events that took his life, that's all we have to go by. He is being evaluated based on his previous actions in the store.

@plastic

So Michael Brown was totally responsible for his own death. Because?

Because he committed a crime. He stole something. Because he is still technically a minor, whether he had a criminal record or not if I am correct will not be disclosed, unless the prosecution wants it during the trial, but him stealing and if he were alive, for sure that would have created a criminal record.

Because he had a long record of being a 'thug'? Brown had no criminal record.

His actions in the store amount to "thuggery," yes.

Because he stole some cigars? Wilson did not know about that, and even if he did, it doesn't warrant shooting an unarmed man for it.

No, but attacking an officer does, if that is what happened.

Because he was jaywalking? Not a reason to shoot somebody.

No, but attitude and conduct does and Brown did not handle himself like the so called smart person everyone claims him to be.

Because he threatened Wilson? We don't know about that, but Brown was shot a considerable distance from the patrol car, most likely with his hands in the air.

Again, Dr. Baden said, there is NO way of knowing that nor if he was running or not. But the truth will come out.

I don't see any way you can claim Brown was responsible for his own death, unless being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong skin color (or, as you put it, being a member of the "out of control" nationwide black community), and in the presence of a trigger-happy cop count as just asking to get shot.

Because you don't want to see it, the same way that most liberals don't realize that they have a very serious problem when it comes to race, women and religion You act like a thug, you get treated like a thug. If you get an attitude, don't expect to be treated like royalty.

Darren Wilson never called in the shooting. He never went to check the condition of Michael Brown after he was down. He (or any other cops) never called an ambulance. He has yet to make a statement. You'd think that a cop who was clearly acting in self defense would have done all these things. If Michael Brown was just asking for it, you'd think Darren Wilson's post-incident actions would have been very different.

You and I were not there. I will NOT making any accusatory statements on what happened on the street until the investigation is complete and the facts are brought out.

And why did the Ferguson police leave the body in the middle of the street for four hours?

Don't know. Let me guess....it's because he's Black???

This is a very fishy case, and you're out of line blaming the victim. Cigars, thugs, and 'black on black' crime are irrelevant.

I think the opposite of you for blaming the cop when we have NO real concrete evidence that the cop acted with intent and malice.

Nope! Michael Brown was shot and killed and died without having a single criminal record, and now will never have one. Don't matter what you think and say, the law is the only matter which has not found him guilty of anything. In case you missed this important fact

Sorry, but yes, it does.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/03/michael-brown-juvenile-records-could-be-released

I rest my case. Now is that a smoking gun, maybe, maybe not, but it lead to something bigger with this case and with Brown.

Aug. 15. Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson, said what happened in the store on Aug.9 was unrelated to the shooting and killing of Michael Brown

But if the courts want to see any records on Brown, the prosecution will have to turn everything over, no mater what.

You have denied Michael Brown a fair trial and hearing and found him guilty since your first comment which makes you guilty of the lynch mob mentality?

Lynch mob??? You libs crack me up, all of you guys are wanting to crucify this cop. None of you know what happened, but none you guys have any facts, just accusations a guess here and there and some eyewitnesses that some have already been found to be unreliable. I have denied Michael Brown nothing, I was just stating the facts. Michael Brown was guilty once he snagged that box of cigars. Had he done that, I wouldn't have a beef with Brown's conduct, but as such, that never happened. Michael Brown made his decision when he decided, screw the system. I'm going to take whatever I want, when I wasn't ever I want and that attitude is what got him killed.

But the Chief of police stated that there was no connection to whatever happened in the store and the shooting and killing of Michael Brown. Strange, how the police accept that but not you?

Because it's up to the Grand Jury to make that determination, that's why I don't accept it.

The autopsy shows that Brown was shot with his arms up.

That's again, one side. If you want to believe that version, fine. There are always two sides of every story.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/did-michael-brown-have-his-hands-up-when-killed-by/article_f9904f19-dba5-58b4-ac4b-56b9bda29646.html

Even if you shot a real badarse I think the cop would normally call for medical help.

True, but nowadays, everyone has a phone and a camera and even if the cop doesn't call, more than likely someone else will.

Technically, now he does. (Referring to Brown's criminal record.)

Technically, he most certainly does not -- regarding the store incident. Our legal system requires charges to be filed, usually by the victim, and then for a case to be presented to a court of law. While a citizen might phone in something they think has happened, it is up for the store to confirm if a theft actually took place. In in the case of a suspected theft, only they can press charges. Technically: no charge - no crime. And no crime = no criminal record.

Michael Brown was guilty once he snagged that box of cigars.

Only the store owner can confirm that they were actually snagged, and the owner has not done that. For all anyone knows, it may have been Brown was short on the amount by less than a dollar. Unless the owner provides the necessary testimony, justifying Brown's death on account of the store video is the same thing as wanting him lynched. Calling him a criminal without having charges filed and his being found guilty in a court is just another part of the smear campaign.

lean on the possibility that perhaps Brown wasn't the Saint that people in his community make him out to be.

First of all, the people of Brown's community knew him better, obviously, that you or anyone here does. The only wrong-doing that Wilson personally observed Brown committing was jaywalking. Anyone who has looked at Canfield Drive knows it is a quiet, narrow, residential street -- the kind kids play in all the time.

Because cops are humans, they have bad days like anyone else and some cops are jerks and you don't want to push the jerk cops around and give them a reason to do anything.

Because you have claimed that cops have license to kill, you now seem to be adding that cops have the right to abuse their power and mistreat citizens at will. If they have a license to kill, surely you must be granting them a license to be verbally and physically abusive to people. Wilson initiated the encounter by being verbally abusive. Then he starts to drive off and something ticks him off and he puts his car into a speedy reverse and slams on his brakes, coming very close to the two men. That action, related by several eyewitnesses, provides an indication to Wilson's state of mind at the moment: It was Wilson who was seeking an abusive confrontation. The moment Wilson's arm came out of his vehicle to physically manhandle Brown, the fault was his. It was Wilson who was playing the thug at that moment.

Of course, some will argue that the reason society gives cops badges and guns is so they can have a license to kill and play the thug when they want to. (And that society has to treat them with extreme caution because they might be having a bad day.) Fortunately, a majority in society -- including police officers -- will not agree with lunatics who claim they have such a license.

There were also witnesses that said the opposite that Brown bum rushed the officer

That is a false statement. There are no independent witnesses who have claimed Brown rushed the officer. Zero. There are now seven eyewitnesses -- who were at the scene -- who claim Brown was in a position of trying to surrender. Repeat: there have been no witnesses who were at the scene who claim Brown tried to rush Wilson. None.

So why continue to repeat that falsehood?

The police officer Darren Wilson is still alive and will have to justify to the Grand Jury why he felt threatened enough to empty his gun, with six bullets hitting Michael Brown and at least one hitting a building.

Sorry, I am still trying to grasp the idea of a violent confrontation erupting over jaywalking on a quiet residential street, and an 18-year-old kid -- unarmed -- lying dead within 90 seconds or so. And that, rather than point to the police officer who initiated the confrontation over jaywalking, and who emptied his gun at the young man -- we are supposed to try to pretend that the young man was no "saint." (Meaning he somehow got what he deserved.)

You know what I think really happened at that vehicle? Wilson pulled up so close to the two and was trying to exit his vehicle and Brown was blocking his door and wouldn't let him get out so that Wilson could heap more abuse on them. The way Johnson tells the story, the door "ricocheted" off of Brown and closed on Wilson. I don't believe it was quite so "unintended." Now Wilson's anger is getting out of control. It won't be long before Wilson reaches for his weapon.

In my opinion, since society vests a far higher degree of responsibility in police officers -- and certainly more than in 18-year-old jaywalking kids -- there should be FAR higher consequences to pay when one of these officers mismanages a situation as Wilson did.

a judge considers two media requests to release any *possible juvenile records:

Which I was right? Consider and possible, meaning there is a chance.

After that altercation with Wilson, he does now, theoretically.

a judge considers two media requests to release any *possible juvenile records:

Juvenile records are confidential in Missouri, so it’s not definitively known if Brown was arrested before he legally became an adult. Police have said Brown had no adult criminal record.

Confidential, but subject to being called in and looked at by the Judge and prosecution if needed.

The efforts to obtain Brown’s juvenile records – if there are any – have been criticized by some who say his past conduct is irrelevant to the question of whether Wilson responded with excessive force.

That doesn't mean! it's going to be ruled out! Whether it's fair or not is irrelevant. It's what the courts want, if they find it vital to their case.

Even before you know if Michael Brown had a juvenile record and if he even did how that would relate to his shooting and killing by Darren Wilson, who date hasn't made any kind of public statement or whether he has been suspended during the investigation.

Oh, NO you don't! It's important to see what kind of person he was. I think it's very important to know everything about this kid, if we need to know everything about Wilson, the same should go for brown.

Nope! When did I even accuse Darren Wilson of anything? I've asked that one several times but you refuse to answer that question?????

You and Yabits accused Wilson of gunning down brown for no reason, which apparently seems more like there was. There is MY answer.

That then applies to you too and while I haven't accused the officier Darren Wilson of anything you have found Michael Brown guilty of stealing and also his own death ever since your first comment on this very tragic story.

Unlike you guys, I never, ever said, I have the facts or the facts what we know so far are either accurate or exaggerated. I have always said, I will wait until the facts come out, you and Yabits should do the same.

But the Grand Jury will listen to what the Ferguson police chief had to say which was "there was no connection to whatever happened in the store and the shooting and killing of Michael Brown."

As they will also listen to whatever evidence his side has including that Brown bum rushed and tried to kill possibly officer Brown.

Very wrong on that point. Its the duty of the police to serve and protect even a badarse so no a cop would be required to call for medical help but in this case Wilson didn't even call in the shooting and the police preferred to search for bullets than to cover up or even remove the corpse of Michael Brown???

Yes! But because everyone is connected to the world, I have seen a few times where people had called the ambulance before the cops had a chance to, so yes, it does happen.

@yabits

Technically, he most certainly does not -- regarding the store incident.

We don't know that yet. The records are confidential, remember?

Our legal system requires charges to be filed, usually by the victim, and then for a case to be presented to a court of law. While a citizen might phone in something they think has happened, it is up for the store to confirm if a theft actually took place. In in the case of a suspected theft, only they can press charges. Technically: no charge - no crime. And no crime = no criminal record.

Yeah, he's dead, so at this point, it really doesn't matter.

Only the store owner can confirm that they were actually snagged, and the owner has not done that.

Possibly for fear of reprisals. "Snitchin' leaves you in stitches"

For all anyone knows, it may have been Brown was short on the amount by less than a dollar.

Yeah, that's why he took those cigars, the store owner said, he'll put it on Brown's tab and when brown was leaving, he forgot to sign an IOU form. Gotcha!

Unless the owner provides the necessary testimony, justifying Brown's death on account of the store video is the same thing as wanting him lynched. Calling him a criminal without having charges filed and his being found guilty in a court is just another part of the smear campaign.

The way you guys are doing to Wilson? Strange.....

First of all, the people of Brown's community knew him better, obviously, that you or anyone here does.

That includes you guys as well, don't forget that, please

The only wrong-doing that Wilson personally observed Brown committing was jaywalking. Anyone who has looked at Canfield Drive knows it is a quiet, narrow, residential street -- the kind kids play in all the time.

That remains to be seen, we don't know that yet.

Because you have claimed that cops have license to kill,

So the gun is just there as an ornament to look cool? of course not. They hold the license and power over "life and death."

you now seem to be adding that cops have the right to abuse their power and mistreat citizens at will.

I NEVER said that.

If they have a license to kill, surely you must be granting them a license to be verbally and physically abusive to people. Wilson initiated the encounter by being verbally abusive. Then he starts to drive off and something ticks him off and he puts his car into a speedy reverse and slams on his brakes, coming very close to the two men. That action, related by several eyewitnesses, provides an indication to Wilson's state of mind at the moment: It was Wilson who was seeking an abusive confrontation. The moment Wilson's arm came out of his vehicle to physically manhandle Brown, the fault was his. It was Wilson who was playing the thug at that moment.

Or when the officer tried to confront Brown for Jaywalking, he slammed the car door on the officer, which is already an assault charge right there and on that alone, he can lock him up. But these where eyewitnesses that saw the altercation between the two.

Of course, some will argue that the reason society gives cops badges and guns is so they can have a license to kill and play the thug when they want to. (And that society has to treat them with extreme caution because they might be having a bad day.) Fortunately, a majority in society -- including police officers -- will not agree with lunatics who claim they have such a license.

It ges both ways, you have gang thugs and you have a few cop thugs. The majority of cops are decent law abiding hardworking individuals that put their life on the line everyday for us.

That is a false statement.

No, there were. I'm just going by the same, you read reports and so did I.

There are no independent witnesses who have claimed Brown rushed the officer. Zero.

You need to be careful, you don't know, sorry.

There are now seven eyewitnesses -- who were at the scene -- who claim Brown was in a position of trying to surrender. Repeat: there have been no witnesses who were at the scene who claim Brown tried to rush Wilson. None.

It doesn't matter what you say, I am going by what the prosecution will have and the evidence will come out. Let me make that clear.

So why continue to repeat that falsehood?

Only if you want to accept it as such. There are two sides to every story.

no you don't get away with your hearsay comment.

Hearsay, you say? Oh, please!

i questioned why Wilson felt so threatened by an unarmed teenager that he had to empty his pistol into him even though some say he had his hands up in surrender.

When you have a person that is about 6'4 in and over 200 lbs, possibly coming towards me and possibly the person had assaulted me, NOT only would a lay a round in the individual, I might reload and pop off another round if it were to come to that, because when you get a beat down from a guy that big, you will not forget that. I guarantee you that. You might as well go up against a raging bull. But if that were the case, I am in danger that I might lose my life and that kind of guy were coming against me, of course I would use force to stop the person, even if that includes deadly force, because as a cop in that kind of situation, I would be within my rights to use justifiable force. Deadly if necessary.

There is MY answer.

When you have a person that is about 6'4 in and over 200 lbs, possibly coming towards me and possibly the person had assaulted me

Let's not forget Wilson chose to leave the safety of a pretty heavy-duty police vehicle in order to pursue the unarmed jaywalker he physically confronted -- after already getting off at least one round from the vehicle. Nobody disputes that Brown and Johnson were running away. Wilson exited the safety of his vehicle clearly looking for trouble, instead of calling for backup.

None of the seven eyewitnesses has Wilson saying or yelling anything to the suspect after leaving his vehicle -- just shooting. Normally, a police officer shouts commands for a suspect to comply with. Wilson appears to have let his weapon do all of his talking for him.

I don't have a problem with that, but I just find it interesting how Holder was dragging his feet ... But what I fear is that Holder will turn this (it technically already is) into a racial issue.

And so we have an attempt to smear Holder, just as Brown and the entire African-American community of Ferguson have been smeared ("out-of control").

What is not recognized is how successful and effective the Justice Department has been under Holder in precisely these types of cases where a large segment of the population has lost faith in their police department.

“The reason we’ve been able to do that is because we’ve been able to get police departments and chiefs who then talk to other chiefs and say, you know, ‘The Department of Justice is not a gotcha organization, they’re not in here to try to get a notch on their belt. They’re here to try to diagnose the problem, help you reform the department,’” Perez added.

Perez said police officers from various communities would often privately thank him for the Justice Department’s involvement, saying it made their jobs easier when they had the trust of the community they were policing.

“Whether it’s large or small, what I have observed in virtually all the cases that I have been involved in is that there is frequently a crisis of confidence in the police department, whether it was the Los Angeles Police Department years ago, or whether it was in East Haven more recently,” Perez said. “If the public doesn’t trust the police department, or if a substantial subset of the public doesn’t trust the police department, it’s tough for officers to do their job, it’s hard to command respect, because the community is your eyes and ears. That certainly is a common denominator in many cases in which we initiate investigations.”

First, I thank the posters who keep asking the right questions.

Regarding the investigation, I mentioned that Wilson would likely plead the Fifth if asked to testify in front of the grand jury. Someone immediately chimed in with "that's his right."

Technically, that is correct, but I am feeling stronger as time passes that people like police who commit questionable acts in the course of their duties should be required to sign a contract waiving their fifth amendment rights as part of their job. I can understand and agree with how the fifth amendment is designed to protect individual, private citizens from their government. But in this case, it would be used to protect a sworn government official from having to answer to the people. Especially in the case of a police officer killing someone in a manner he thinks is carrying out his duties, he should not be able to suddenly pretend he's entitled to the protections afforded a private citizen.

Thanks to zichi's questions, there's a real problem or contradiction that this situation makes more clear. Let me add another question, and see if Wilson's behavior makes any sense in light of it: "When did Wilson first consider that Brown the Jaywalker was dangerous?" (Dangerous enough to require deadly force to subdue.)

It's a very simple question. We could answer: "While still in the car." At least one shot was fired from the car. A police officer firing his weapon is a very major event. One would expect the first thing that would be done is the officer getting on the radio to relay that a shot has been fired and a [dangerous] suspect is running -- and to call for backup. This would have taken time, and eyewitnesses say Wilson immediately emerged from the vehicle with his weapon drawn to pursue the fleeing suspects. There is no indication whatsoever of Wilson getting on the radio immediately.

A police on the radio calling for backup when a shot has been fired would not be considered a "rogue cop. " A cop who leaves the safety of his vehicle without calling in the situation is either acting in a rogue fashion OR does not perceive the situation to be all that dangerous. It can't be both ways. Especially when the suspects are unarmed. A third reason would be to exact revenge. I am inclined to go with that because Wilson did not communicate -- either to his own people via radio, or to the suspect -- No eyewitness has Wilson shouting any orders, just shooting.

It's precisely this kind of scenario that helps me understand better why Wilson would want to pretend he's not a part of genuine law enforcement, but by taking the Fifth, a private, enraged individual on a personal vendetta.

@bass4funk

Open mouth and insert foot. The more you comment the more you expose yourself as being prejudice towards African-Americans.

The black community is out of control?? Pfffft. Yeah everybody is running around like a chicken that has had it head chopped off. "Oh look at that!" "They are like savages to you, aren't they".

NONE OF THIS IS TRUE!!!

These people are GUILTY of only one thing.....poverty. Inner city people have it bad. Even for police it's capitalism. They are poor, they don't have money to fight all these cases. Society fines these people, stacks up interest on anything late and then calls them criminals when they can't pay.

Life expectancy for an African American was greater in the Vietnam war than it is in the U.S TODAY!! Soldiers who survived the Iraq war came back to the ol U.S of A to get shot by some cop! U.S: Veteran: You shot me!!!!! What the hell is that for? Police Officer: "That was for coming back to the U.S"

Bring back Public Enemy and Boogie Down Productions because nothing has changed. 911 is a Joke!!!

I had a chat on the phone with a very good friend of mine who is a rather high-level lawyer with knowledge in this particular area of the law, and I asked her for the first time since it happened about the Ferguson shooting.

What do you think about the Ferguson shooting?

I was surprised by how it grew and grew.

Do you think the police officer wrongly shot Brown?

I honestly don't know what to think about it because I haven't seen all of the evidence, but I also haven't heard the police officer's side of the story yet. He hasn't been seen, but it's important to hear his version about why he did what he did. I've only been hearing and reading about this case from one side (the MB side), so I will hold off on my judgment. However, I will say this, there are good cops and bad cops and I know for a fact that there are police officers who will and do lie so you have to be careful not to believe them just because they are police officers. Also, I didn't care for the out of control rioting that went on and all of the businesses which were destroyed or will relocate as a result of this. That was a real shame.

All of the rioters causing trouble were from outside areas, weren't they?

I wouldn't be too sure about that.

(PS @zichi that's a lot of supposition on lies from the police chief, "anything from Wilson, not even via a lawyer which seems an unusual way" isn't it?)

stormcrow: .... All of the rioters causing trouble were from outside areas, weren't they? ... I wouldn't be too sure about that. ...

7 out of 163 doesn't really seem significant, except for being that low.

http://www.kmov.com/special-coverage-001/Of-163-arrests-since-shooting-7-from-Ferguson-272171341.html

Of 163 arrests since shooting, 7 from Ferguson - August 21, 2014

.... It shows that 128 people have been arrested for failure to disperse, 21 for burglary-related charges, four for assaulting police officers. Others were charged with crimes such as trespassing, peace disturbance and destruction of private property. ...

http://www.kmov.com/news/slideshows/mugshots/Photos-270986911.html?gallery=y&c=y

Photos: Several arrests made for looting in Ferguson

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/19/video-communist-revolutionaries-travel-from-chicago-nyc-to-incite-riots-in-ferguson/

As the outraged community in Ferguson, Missouri, continues to protest the officer-involved shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown, radical communist revolutionaries from places like Chicago and New York City are seemingly infiltrating the local demonstrations and allegedly attempting to “incite” riots.

A video uploaded on YouTube Tuesday shows Gregory Lee Johnson, a veteran member of the Revolutionary Communist Party, riling up a crowd and seemingly discouraging them from listening to police’s advice to calm things down. Watch that video here (Strong language warning): ...

don't challenge the officer, especially if he/she is in a bad mood

An officer of the law has no business letting a member of the public see that s/he is 'in a bad mood'. Mood should make no difference to the officer's professional conduct. Are you saying now that Brown died because he got on the wrong side of a police officer who was in a bad mood? And that being in a bad mood justifies an officer emptying his gun into an unarmed person?

@bass4funk

Open mouth and insert foot. The more you comment the more you expose yourself as being prejudice towards African-Americans.

I'd say the more he comments, the more he portrays American society as a whole in a very bad light, in addition to his views on certain sections of that society.

Anyone know what percentage of the remaining 3% is actually white? Not defending Ferguson PD, but can't their critics come up with an actually relevant example of discrimination?

Whites are found with contraband 34% of the time when stopped in Ferguson, blacks somewhere about 22%, much less frequently, which would indicate that whites are stopped for probable cause, and blacks are stopped much more often, for driving while black. Assuming that drug use is roughly the same in both groups, how many more blacks have to be stopped for the contraband discovery rate to be watered down to by 12% ?

Here is evidence of discrimination for you, preying on poverty to line the coffers--this article is VERY long but well worth the read.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/09/03/how-st-louis-county-missouri-profits-from-poverty/

I think it's not unusual for anyone to not release a public statement if they're facing possibility of trial. Sometimes their lawyers have to tell them to shut up and not talk to media before trial, right? However, anyone's opinion of "unusual" would have to have some stats attached to make it more than an opinion. That also goes on whether not releasing police report is unusual. Think they specifically mentioned they want to avoid witness collaboration / tainting, in not releasing more info. May also apply to jury pool.

Re possibility of beating it'll probably be considered at grand jury, who should have any photo evidence. I didn't notice any videos that were made at a close enough distance to say yes or no on that.

Read somewhere they've accelerated the grand jury process for this one.

Re news articles, noticed a lot of them are paraphrasing small fragments out of context (like the Baden quotes), and anyone reading most of these news reports could come up with whatever scenario they like based on that. And I'm talking the actual articles not just the comments below them. Look at the preliminary MH-17 report release today, the Dutch only said "high-energy objects", that could be missile or shell fragments or entire shells, not enough to say which, but some news articles then go on to say it indicates a missile. It's hard to find original text. For the Baden quote it was really useful to find the actual video clip where he discusses range and transcribe it, not rely on the hundreds of short paraphrased quotes which after rolling around the media world could be stretched to put Wilson either near or far.

Re lying, this is from Sept 05: http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/did-ferguson-police-chief-mislead-public-about-robbery-video/article_f5ed9c93-8d40-5585-8f6d-a7767db8ae67.html

Did Ferguson police chief mislead public about robbery video?

... The Post-Dispatch filed a public records request the day the video was released, requesting all the written requests for records that the city had received. The records, which were provided to the newspaper 11 days later, showed that no organization had specifically requested before Aug. 15 a video of Michael Brown robbing a convenience store. But requests from the Post-Dispatch and the organization Judicial Watch sought all documents related to Brown leading up to and including the shooting. A third request from ABC News asked for any video and audio records associated with Brown’s death. The Post-Dispatch reporter who made one of those requests, Joel Currier, said he had heard rumors prior to Aug. 15 that Brown had committed a robbery just before he was killed. But Currier had no indication the alleged robbery was captured on video. Currier said he requested video hoping police had dash-cam video of Brown’s killing. ...

All of your comments are fine, but, from a legal perspective, we still have not heard Wilson make any formal statement or announcement about his actions. When he does, then you can start comparing how the eyewitness testimonies and evidence jives or doesn't jive with what he says.

No stone left unturned, right?

zichi: Even the Ferguson police chief has stated that whatever happened at the store was related to he shooting ...

I think you probably meant "wasn't related", but even so, didn't the chief change his tune the same day he said that? Subsequent news reports have indicated the events were related. Police dept. does get to pick and choose what it releases, especially after asked for 'any related video'. If they want to justify, so what? They could say they needed to release the evidence they had on Brown to avoid riots. Who's going to sue them for that? It's all going to come out in grand jury, trial if any, and Fed investigation.

Below is article link (no quote because JT is imagining some offensive content in it) on why Ferguson does not have an incident report, and also why they are not releasing what they do have before the grand jury reports, that would include photos of Wilson if any (as far as broken eye socket, random 2nd/3rd-hand claims by anonymous people on blogs or news articles are not the same as testifying to grand jury).

As far as why Wilson did not file an incident report, he's a criminal suspect. Does he have to self-incriminate? Does 5th Amendment apply?

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/michael-brown-shooting/michael-brown-shooting-why-ferguson-police-never-filed-incident-report-n186431

@fpsrussia

Open mouth and insert foot. The more you comment the more you expose yourself as being prejudice towards African-Americans.

So now you know me, you can unequivocally say that without a shadow of a doubt? Keep dreaming.

The black community is out of control?? Pfffft. Yeah everybody is running around like a chicken that has had it head chopped off. "Oh look at that!" "They are like savages to you, aren't they".

Ok, so Chicago, L.A. And most of the Urban black towns are fine, they have prestiges high property value homes, no crime and some of the safest areas and let's not forget, Black males don't have a high incarceration rate. The Black community is fine the way it is. They don't believe in government dependency, ok, sure.

NONE OF THIS IS TRUE!!!

They said the same thing about OJ.

These people are GUILTY of only one thing.....poverty. Inner city people have it bad. Even for police it's capitalism. They are poor, they don't have money to fight all these cases. Society fines these people, stacks up interest on anything late and then calls them criminals when they can't pay.

Wow! Lol

Life expectancy for an African American was greater in the Vietnam war than it is in the U.S TODAY!! Soldiers who survived the Iraq war came back to the ol U.S of A to get shot by some cop! U.S: Veteran: You shot me!!!!! What the hell is that for? Police Officer: "That was for coming back to the U.S"

So what's your point?

Bring back Public Enemy and Boogie Down Productions because nothing has changed. 911 is a Joke!!!

Oh, please...

@cleo

An officer of the law has no business letting a member of the public see that s/he is 'in a bad mood'. Mood should make no difference to the officer's professional conduct. Are you saying now that Brown died because he got on the wrong side of a police officer who was in a bad mood? And that being in a bad mood justifies an officer emptying his gun into an unarmed person?

Cleo, you are living in a dream world. I have been to 22 countries and I have met cops in many of those countries good, stupid and in between, even in the UK, I have met cops that were clearly out of their depth and their conduct was rude and abrasive. Now do I paint all of them with a broad brush, of course not. They are people and people are not robots. They should be professional, but remember they are humans first. What happened to Brown was his own fault. He was the one that dictated the outcome of the incident. He had a choice and he choose to be a smartass.

I'd say the more he comments, the more he portrays American society as a whole in a very bad light, in addition to his views on certain sections of that society.

If ANY person that would judge a country based on comments alone, should never travel. Those people should stay at home, read the paper and order a yearly subscription to National Geographic.

@yabits

First, I thank the posters who keep asking the right questions.

The questions you think that in your opinion is right, but everyone else's is wrong?

Regarding the investigation, I mentioned that Wilson would likely plead the Fifth if asked to testify in front of the grand jury. Someone immediately chimed in with "that's his right."

He has the right to do so. Doesn't mean he's either guilty or not.

Technically, that is correct, but I am feeling stronger as time passes that people like police who commit questionable acts in the course of their duties should be required to sign a contract waiving their fifth amendment rights as part of their job. I can understand and agree with how the fifth amendment is designed to protect individual, private citizens from their government. But in this case, it would be used to protect a sworn government official from having to answer to the people. Especially in the case of a police officer killing someone in a manner he thinks is carrying out his duties, he should not be able to suddenly pretend he's entitled to the protections afforded a private citizen.

Again, that is just a wild guess, we will know, but we are not sure how and what the outcome will be, so NO guessing. It's up in the air.

Thanks to zichi's questions, there's a real problem or contradiction that this situation makes more clear. Let me add another question, and see if Wilson's behavior makes any sense in light of it: "When did Wilson first consider that Brown the Jaywalker was dangerous?" (Dangerous enough to require deadly force to subdue.)

He must've had a real good reason, if some thug is trying to man handle and beat me down, what is the man supposed to do? Allow this so called gentle giant pummel him some more? We need to find out. I'm waiting for Wilson's side of the story to come out, there is more than meets the eye.

It's a very simple question. We could answer: "While still in the car." At least one shot was fired from the car. A police officer firing his weapon is a very major event. One would expect the first thing that would be done is the officer getting on the radio to relay that a shot has been fired and a [dangerous] suspect is running -- and to call for backup. This would have taken time, and eyewitnesses say Wilson immediately emerged from the vehicle with his weapon drawn to pursue the fleeing suspects. There is no indication whatsoever of Wilson getting on the radio immediately.

You are not a cop, you have never been in a hostile situation and you have, I'm assuming never have been attacked by some thug? I have seen first hand how combative some of these kids can get and every time, they get tased, or they get wrestled down to the floor. I have witnessed a few times where the cops had to draw their gun because some thug was walking up and taunting the cop. Bad move and if you get shot, oh, well. When the cop gives you an order, just comply. Simple as that.

A police on the radio calling for backup when a shot has been fired would not be considered a "rogue cop. " A cop who leaves the safety of his vehicle without calling in the situation is either acting in a rogue fashion OR does not perceive the situation to be all that dangerous. It can't be both ways. Especially when the suspects are unarmed. A third reason would be to exact revenge. I am inclined to go with that because Wilson did not communicate -- either to his own people via radio, or to the suspect -- No eyewitness has Wilson shouting any orders, just shooting.

That's your personal interpretation of what possibly might have happened. But there is no clear indicator that it's the actual facts, well none are, since we really don't know.

It's precisely this kind of scenario that helps me understand better why Wilson would want to pretend he's not a part of genuine law enforcement, but by taking the Fifth, a private, enraged individual on a personal vendetta.

Or that brown had it in for the cop, having possibly being a racist or having racist attitudes for cops and even whites decided that, he was not going to allow some white cop tell him what to do and acted to probably impress his friends and thought he could take on the officer and the result was, he got shot in the end and now he's 6 feet under. You mess with the bull, you get the horns.

Cleo, you are living in a dream world.

No, I'm living in Japan where the cops are polite and professional (the vast majority of them, anyway) and where I have no fears at all of either myself or my family ever getting shot by a cop in a bad mood.

What happened to Brown was his own fault. He was the one that dictated the outcome of the incident. He had a choice and he choose to be a smarts.

But we shouldn't make any judgements until we have all the facts, right? lol

If ANY person that would judge a country based on comments alone, should never travel.

No one is judging a country based on comments. I'm judging you, based on your comments.

I have witnessed a few times where the cops had to draw their gun because some thug was walking up and taunting the cop. Bad move and if you get shot, oh, well.

You live in a world where cops are justified in shooting unarmed members of the public in response to taunts?? Seriously? I'm not the one living in Dreamland, bass.

yabits is correct; if Wilson felt he was in any danger he should have first radio'd for back-up (and to report that a shot had already been fired) from the safety of his car. If he did not feel he was in any danger, he had no business shooting. You can't have it both ways.

brown had it in for the cop

Oh come on. If the cop hadn't stopped there would have been no altercation at all.

The questions you think that in your opinion is right, but everyone else's is wrong?

Questions are always more important than answers, especially as a diagnostic tool. You believe that ordinary citizens are not intelligent enough to look at the available data -- which is abundant at this point -- and start to ask very probing questions based upon reason and reality. Well, you are only betraying yourself there.

You have already admitted that you're heavily biased in favor of the police. You have relative who is on the force and you think you have a good understanding of them. Bias tends to work against understanding however. And so on to the questions:

He must've had a real good reason, if some thug is trying to man handle and beat me down, what is the man supposed to do?

I don't agree he would necessarily have a reason that is "good" to impartial observers. The reason that might have seemed "good" to him was that he was simply very angry at the man who he felt affronted him. You have already indicated that the public should be very wary of cops who are having a bad day. You are pretending that just because he's a police, he must have had a good reason. That's a biased assumption that does not fit with the reality of the situation. The reality being this: The man who affronted Wilson now has moved 30 or more feet away from the car. A distance already confirmed by the police and multiple eyewitnesses. It is irrational to accuse a man of trying to deliver a beat-down from 30 feet away. (So, one wonders why you keep doing it.)

I'm waiting for Wilson's side of the story to come out, there is more than meets the eye.

Simple question: How will you know that the version Wilson tells is not a lie? Is it rational to buy his story at face value? Actually, I think Wilson's story isn't all that important at this point. The far more important questions must be directed to the Ferguson Police Department regarding the known behavior of their officer: 1) What is standard procedure as soon as an officer fires his weapon at a citizen or suspect? 2) As soon as Officer Wilson fired the first shot from within the vehicle, did he follow standard police procedure from that point?

No, I'm living in Japan where the cops are polite and professional (the vast majority of them, anyway) and where I have no fears at all of either myself or my family ever getting shot by a cop in a bad mood.

I too, do not have those fears, I have never had a violent, dangerous situation dealing with the cops, because I and my family and the people around me don't need to be confrontational with cops nor would we ever get an attitude with a peace officer, that doesn't mean you won't bump into a jerk. I have met more idiotic cops over in Japan, than in the states, violent, NO. But not having a shred of beans, quite a few. But that's my experience, I am just going by that. So it all depends.

But we shouldn't make any judgements until we have all the facts, right? lol

Exactly, Cleo, exactly!

No one is judging a country based on comments. I'm judging you, based on your comments.

Then you must know that I am a person that likes to bring sweetness and sunshine wherever I go.

You live in a world where cops are justified in shooting unarmed members of the public in response to taunts?? Seriously? I'm not the one living in Dreamland, bass.

No, it's reality, maybe in your world, but in the bigger world and the places where I have been and reported, these things happen. Had Brown NOT acted like a thug, he'd still be alive. I really believe that.

yabits is correct; if Wilson felt he was in any danger he should have first radio'd for back-up (and to report that a shot had already been fired) from the safety of his car. If he did not feel he was in any danger, he had no business shooting. You can't have it both ways.

That is NOT necessary a protocol, also none of us were there and to judge the officer saying he should have done XY is completely outrageous and out of touch with reality and shows that people like you have never been in that position to even remotely understand when you have usually less than 1.7 seconds to react, especially if it is a dire situation. When you guys talk, I just chuckle, once you are confronted with an assailant and that individual is unhinged, you have merely a few seconds to make split second decisions. What they teach you at the academy and what happens on the streets are completely and entirely different scenarios.

Oh come on. If the cop hadn't stopped there would have been no altercation at all.

Or if Brown hadn't pummeled his face in, there wouldn't have been an altercation to begin with.

Just sayin'

@yabits

Questions are always more important than answers, especially as a diagnostic tool. You believe that ordinary citizens are not intelligent enough to look at the available data

Yabits, seriously, you don't know what I believe in.

-- which is abundant at this point -- and start to ask very probing questions based upon reason and reality. Well, you are only betraying yourself there.

And right back at you as well. There are always, always two sides to every story.

You have already admitted that you're heavily biased in favor of the police.

And you for Brown.

You have relative who is on the force and you think you have a good understanding of them. Bias tends to work against understanding however. And so on to the questions:

No, sorry, you are flat out wrong. I live next to a Black community and I know the crime and murder rate in that city was off the charts at one point, it has gone down, but that's ONLY because of the heavy police presence, there is still a shooting almost every few days. I see what the cops have to deal with in that community and this city is a hellhole. No sane person would ever dream of living there if they have a choice, the attitudes of many of the resident towards the law is atrocious, condescending and combative. I have seen how many of them talk to the police and usually the police take a non-threatening stance and try to comfort, understand how many of the residents feel and still often many of the people are out of line, so it doesn't matter, the cops try, but often even when they try to make that connection, the people don't trust or not interested in having a peaceful co-existence.

I don't agree he would necessarily have a reason that is "good" to impartial observers. The reason that might have seemed "good" to him was that he was simply very angry at the man who he felt affronted him. You have already indicated that the public should be very wary of cops who are having a bad day. You are pretending that just because he's a police, he must have had a good reason. That's a biased assumption that does not fit with the reality of the situation.

That is just BS, seriously! I am NOT on Wilson's side because he's a cop, I don't have a dog in this fight. Brown was shot for doing something he shouldn't have. What do I care? I don't know him, I just want the officer to have his day in court and to hear some of you wanting this guy to swing from a tree when NONE of us know whether he's innocent or just sickens me. There is always the presumption of innocence until proven guilty. Nothing bias about it. It would be bias for me to think that Wilson is totally innocent of any crime and Brown was an innocent lad. That would be bias and I am not.

The reality being this: The man who affronted Wilson now has moved 30 or more feet away from the car. A distance already confirmed by the police and multiple eyewitnesses. It is irrational to accuse a man of trying to deliver a beat-down from 30 feet away. (So, one wonders why you keep doing it.)

Because I think you're wrong, quite simple. I don't believe in that theory, because it has NOT been proven in a court of law.

Simple question: How will you know that the version Wilson tells is not a lie?

I don't know, the same way that some of the witnesses that were questioned, have been disqualified and taken apart, some were proven to not have been credible.

Is it rational to buy his story at face value? Actually, I think Wilson's story isn't all that important at this point. The far more important questions must be directed to the Ferguson Police Department regarding the known behavior of their officer: 1) What is standard procedure as soon as an officer fires his weapon at a citizen or suspect? 2) As soon as Officer Wilson fired the first shot from within the vehicle, did he follow standard police procedure from that point?

I wasn't there, neither were you, therefore, we can't answer that question.

I don't know, the same way that some of the witnesses that were questioned, have been disqualified and taken apart, some were proven to not have been credible.

You have made a statement. Where have these witnesses proven not to have been credible? Disqualified by who, specifically? Which witnesses, specifically? What source are you using to base that statement on?

But we shouldn't make any judgements until we have all the facts, right? lol

Exactly, Cleo, exactly!

But without having any of the facts (you weren't there, remember), you are able to say categorically and repeatedly that Brown caused his own death? That Brown was shot for doing something he shouldn't have, that Brown pummeled his face in, that Had Brown NOT acted like a thug, he'd still be alive (though we do not have the facts of who did what)? The ONLY undisputed facts we have are that an unarmed 18-year-old was shot dead in the street by a cop, several yards from the police car.

once you are confronted with an assailant and that individual is unhinged

Wilson was the one doing the confronting; you have no basis bar your bias to suggest that Brown was unhinged. Stick to the facts, bass.

these things happen

WWII happened, 9/11 happened, the fact that something happens doesn't mean it's right or justified or that we should condone it.

Then you must know that I am a person that likes to bring sweetness and sunshine wherever I go.

From your comments I understand that you are a person who lives in a scary world of hair-trigger cops likely to shoot at unarmed civilians if they happen to be having a bad day, where a taunt forces a cop to draw his weapon; a world in which it's apparently OK to judge a person by stereotype.

people like you have never been in that position to even remotely understand when you have usually less than 1.7 seconds to react, especially if it is a dire situation

It would have taken Wilson longer than 1.7 secs to even get out of the car. Maybe the situation wasn't as dire as you're trying hard to believe it was (in the absence of the facts, of course)?

And who are these witnesses who have been proven not to have been credible, who have been disqualified and taken apart? (apart of course from the Ferguson chief of police, who was caught telling porkies about why the cigar-shop video was released)

U.S. Justice Department to investigate Ferguson police

Now just need someone to investigate the US Justice Department. Under Holder it is the most racist institution in America.

You have made a statement. Where have these witnesses proven not to have been credible? Disqualified by who, specifically? Which witnesses, specifically? What source are you using to base that statement on?

Of course, I don't know any of these people by name, but there were 8 different accounts of people saying they saw Brown bum rushing the officer, I am not saying it's true or not, just as we cannot say the other statements are true, people do make up stuff and often eyewitnesses are known to embellish or exaggerate as story.

@cleo

But without having any of the facts (you weren't there, remember), you are able to say categorically and repeatedly that Brown caused his own death?

You are right. Just like EVERYONE else, I'm equally going on a hunch with the little we have to work with. I NEVER said, my facts are accurate, Never. But I believe the events of what happened that day as a result based of the evidence, to me and many people it looks like Brown was the aggressor.

That Brown was shot for doing something he shouldn't have, that Brown pummeled his face in, that Had Brown NOT acted like a thug, he'd still be alive (though we do not have the facts of who did what)? The ONLY undisputed facts we have are that an unarmed 18-year-old was shot dead in the street by a cop, several yards from the police car.

Yes, and in my opinion, it was Brown that got Brown killed. No matter how many excuses you make, the kid had control over the events that took his life. Again, it matters little to me, but the bigger picture and the moral lesson to be learned is, listen to the cops, don't confront them and try to act all tough, it'll get you nowhere, but trouble very fast!

Wilson was the one doing the confronting; you have no basis bar your bias to suggest that Brown was unhinged. Stick to the facts, bass.

I am, so should you. Brown was the one that initiated the confrontation first. Wilson had every right to shut that kid down.

WWII happened, 9/11 happened, the fact that something happens doesn't mean it's right or justified or that we should condone it.

lol

From your comments I understand that you are a person who lives in a scary world of hair-trigger cops likely to shoot at unarmed civilians if they happen to be having a bad day, where a taunt forces a cop to draw his weapon; a world in which it's apparently OK to judge a person by stereotype.

I do not live in a scary world, I'm financially well off, have a good life, live in a GREAT community and have great neighbors. We have never had an incident of a person being shot that didn't deserve it. Now if you aare talking about Chicago, then you just might be right. :-)

It would have taken Wilson longer than 1.7 secs to even get out of the car. Maybe the situation wasn't as dire as you're trying hard to believe it was (in the absence of the facts, of course)?

I'm not trying hard to believe anything, I'm just telling you what I believe and spoken to other friends of mine that are cops that believe different, why ask them, they are the people that put their lives on line for all of us.

And who are these witnesses who have been proven not to have been credible, who have been disqualified and taken apart? (apart of course from the Ferguson chief of police, who was caught telling porkies about why the cigar-shop video was released)

I don't know exactly, nor do I have the info and to be honest, I really don't care, I'm just giving my opinion about this kid, just like you guys do,

@zichi

To date, no evidence of that, only hearsay? If that had happened then I think the Ferguson police dept would have released photo's?

That you or I don't know of, but from some of the testimonies of some people, seems like a very high possibility.

@wolfpack

You are so 110% correct.

Of course, I don't know any of these people by name, but there were 8 different accounts of people saying they saw Brown bum rushing the officer

Where are you getting your information that there were eight different accounts of people saying they saw Brown bum rush the officer? Can you provide a source?

Where are you getting your information that there were eight different accounts of people saying they saw Brown bum rush the officer? Can you provide a source?

There are many, but it's really irrelevant, because it breaks down to liberal and conservative, both on diametrically opposite ends. One side sees one perspective, the other side sees another and some are in the middle. If you look, you'll Find it. But for either side it doesn't matter, becuase we need to wait for what the Grand Jury makes it's decision.

there were 8 different accounts of people saying they saw Brown bum rushing the officer

Is this another one of those cases where you are making things up to support your argument? Or do these witness reports actually exist? If they actually exist, then let's see something to support your claims of their existence - a link to some supporting documentation, a news report, a police report or whatever. Unfortunately due to your being caught out for making up 'facts' in the past, it's impossible to give you the benefit of the doubt anymore.

it breaks down to liberal and conservative

Maybe to you, bass, everything breaks down to politics, but that isn't how things work in the real world.

I am not saying it's true or not

Yes you are, you are basing your judgement of Brown's supposed actions on stuff you say 'people make up', putting it out there like it was undisputed fact, and when you're pushed into a corner you wimp out with 'it's just my opinion'.

A very poor show, bass. Very poor indeed.

No matter how many excuses you make

I've made no excuses for anyone.

Brown was the one that initiated the confrontation first.

1)You claim to be a journalist, please try to write like one without mangling the English language. initiated first?? And Wilson initiated second, did he? At the very least, get yourself a good dictionary and use it.

2)Brown could not initiate anything until Wilson stopped his car. Or are you now imagining that, being a big lad, he was able to maybe grab the rear bumper and physically force the police car to a stop?

Wilson had every right to shut that kid down.

That's your opinion, based on ...what? Your gut feeling? Your contempt for those parts of American society you don't like? The 'evidence' of people you've just agreed have no more credibility than people who have given the exact opposite 'evidence'? Or are you saying that any cop in America has the right to go around shooting down lippy kids?

I'm just telling you what I believe and spoken to other friends of mine that are cops that believe different, why ask them

Indeed, why ask them, none of them were there, they know no more than you or I do.

I don't know exactly, nor do I have the info and to be honest, I really don't care,

In a nutshell. Hot air, bass. You've spent several weeks posting comment after comment on something you really don't care about?

I'm just giving my opinion about this kid, just like you guys do,

I have not given any opinion about Brown.

Readers, please stop bickering and refrain from going around in circles.

from zichi's link:

http://fox2now.com/2014/09/08/two-jefferson-county-construction-workers-describe-michael-brown-shooting/

From the workers’ vantage point, about 50 yards away, the worker who talked to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch said he could not tell if Brown’s motion toward Wilson after the shots was “a stumble to the ground” or “OK, I’m going to get you, you’re already shooting me.”

the worker who talked to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch said he could not tell if Brown's motion toward Wilson after the shots was "a stumble to the ground" or "OK, I'm going to get you, you're already shooting me".

After the shots?

the worker described a shot fired while Brown was running away.

What possible explanation can there be for a cop to shoot at a person who is running away?

he threw his hands up and started screaming OK OK OK OK OK and then the three officers come through the thing and the one just started shooting

He started shooting after Brown put his hands up and screamed OK OK OK?

From this account it seems there were three officers on the scene ...?

Have you got an actual point to make???

Sure. That there are different accounts, even from an article you provided the link to people can pick and choose the parts they like. Maybe from the officer's POV Brown was rushing him. Each of these witnesses has a different perspective, and each is probably going to go through multiple interrogations before everything is wrapped up. Few more weeks, or a month or so, and we'll find out more from grand jury. But I wouldn't say 2nd/3rd-hand notes on any of the witness' responses is going to lock things down to anyone's satisfaction, except for those who already disposed to think they know exactly what happened.

@cleo

Maybe to you, bass, everything breaks down to politics, but that isn't how things work in the real world.

Sadly, everything evolves around politics.

1)You claim to be a journalist,

Not claim

please try to write like one without mangling the English language. initiated first?? And Wilson initiated second, did he?

Cleo, ROFL, you are too funny, but nice try.

At the very least, get yourself a good dictionary and use it.

I do, but I feel all the libs would gloss over it, it wouldn't benefit anyone.

2)Brown could not initiate anything until Wilson stopped his car. Or are you now imagining that, being a big lad, he was able to maybe grab the rear bumper and physically force the police car to a stop?

Could be

And throwing ad hom attacks is not helping your argument. Moving one.

The main thing is this, I feel Brown was in the wrong and what happened to him was his own fault, that's it. You are not going to change my mind and I don't want to change your mind and until I see the evidence, I will see the kid as what he was! a thug! pure and simple. Now if Wiilson did shoot Brown in cold blood that changes things and if he is a racist cop with a bad attitude, he should be prosecuted to the fullest extent the law allows. And Brown was NOT a kid, 18 that's an adult, a big adult with an attitude.

You did not give an opinion about Brown, but you did about Wilson and cops in general. That's it.

@zichi

You have expounded us with your insider knowledge of not only the working of the police force, but also their "hearts and minds". But have shown us your extensive knowledge of crime, especially Black crime, and Black on Black crime?

I did. If you need more stats, just let me know.

You mean officer Wilson had the right to empty his deadly weapon into an unarmed teenager who was jaywalking?

I don't know what happened, if he but rushed and attacked the officer beating him down, then he had every right to use necessary force which would be justifiable under the law. I don't, we don't know what happened and regardless the DA and the Grand Jury will have all the details, jaywalking, but rushing, who knows and actually who cares? brown is dead and we have an officer that needs to get his life back IF he is innocent, but we don't dont know.so I hope all the information will come out and be available to the public.

until I see the evidence, I will see the kid as what he was! a thug! pure and simple.

In other words, guilty until proven innocent. Shoot first and ask questions later.

who knows and actually who cares? brown is dead and we have an officer that needs to get his life back IF he is innocent,

Yes, we wouldn't want to get emotional and jump to conclusions about anyone before the facts are in, would we.

@Strangerland

Is this another one of those cases where you are making things up to support your argument?... Unfortunately due to your being caught out for making up 'facts' in the past,

It think it is very clear this is another one of those cases. For some people it might come down to politics, but for me it all comes down to matters of character and integrity. And when a person has been revealed to lack both, who really cares what their politics are? (One can only hope they represent the "other" side.)

@zichi: Thanks for that CNN link. What was compelling to me was the cell phone recording in the moments as Brown was killed, with the eyewitness in shock exclaiming "He had is f***** hands in the air!"

Dishonest people with infantile minds want people to think this was all about Wilson vs. Brown. That if you condemn the officer's actions, it necessarily means you support Brown's. This is actually about Wilson vs. the community he was supposed to be serving, and I hope it causes everyone in the U.S. to look at their local police forces and start asking pointed questions to determine if something as utterly senseless as this even could be repeated. (Who knows who would be the next victim -- running afoul of a rogue cop who's having a "bad day?")

As a citizen, if it came down to a situation where a cop would have to blow out the brains of a teenager in the middle of a residential neighborhood as a result of an altercation over jaywalking, I believe a majority of citizens would agree that it is better to just let kids walk in the street. (We live on a street just like the one in Ferguson and people walk, jog and ride their bikes in it all the time -- as I did this morning.) As a citizen, I don't want police officers pulling out their guns and killing people over petty incidents that they themselves initiated and escalated.

I would want to know from the local police if it is ever acceptable to initiate a contact with a citizen using profanity and disrespectful, abusive language. It is clear that when Wilson decided not to continue driving on, but to put his car into reverse and dramatically back up and squeal his tires -- as several eyewitnesses reported -- that he was choosing to escalate the confrontation. Is this proper police procedure?

Knowing and adhering to proper procedure is critical. As a citizen-taxpayer, I don't want to have to be part of shelling out multi-million dollar payments for wrongful injury or death lawsuits that come about when police are proven to act improperly. More importantly, as a human being, I don't want to give any impression that police have a "license to kill" or to act like the thugs they so often do -- letting their power and authority get to their heads. That's not who or what I want representing my town.

To my town's credit, the local government has already held town meetings regarding the events of the killing of Michael Brown, and many citizens' concerns were raised and answered. The police gave their opinions of where and how the officer let things get out of control from the initial interaction with the two young men, and how stupid they thought it was for him to drive himself back into an altercation that soon became physical. Police procedures are designed to handle those routine, everyday situations -- and to prevent them from turning into what happened in Ferguson.

@yabits

I agree with you, but on the opposite spectrum. But as long as kids think they can act like thugs and spout and attitude towards cops and striking and officer, these kinds of incidents can arise again. Brown was to dense to realize that, but hopefully in his death others will understand, you don't confront a police officer and think you will win, you won't....ever!

I am fortunate to live in a town where the county police have seen what lessons there are to be gained from the gross incompetence and potential criminality of the Ferguson officer, and have communicated to us citizens how they would never have handled it that way. (No police officer believes Brown and Johnson were out to assault Wilson. Wilson brought it on them, with his "Rambo" approach.)

I live in a town where teenage boys are not expected to be saints or geniuses, and they won't have their brains blown out -- none have yet -- for making an error in judgment, if unarmed. The local police have assured citizens that their officers are trained to assess the risks involved in taking on a very large individual (or more than one person) by themselves. These risks are not only to themselves, but to the other people involved as well as to the surrounding community.

Wilson obviously cared nothing about any of this, and thus is a stain on good police officers everywhere. That's why it's so necessary to have good police (at the Federal level) investigate their departments, and start to mold the changes that work so effectively in towns like mine. (Who was the 35-year veteran clown who prided himself on being a "killer?")

Wilson obviously cared nothing about any of this, and thus is a stain on good police officers everywhere. That's why it's so necessary to have good police (at the Federal level) investigate their departments, and start to mold the changes that work so effectively in towns like mine. (Who was the 35-year veteran clown who prided himself on being a "killer?")

I totally disagree. I don't think the police have ANY stains marking them, the perception depends on the individual and not everyone shares that feeling about the police, that is like saying, all Blacks are criminals. Some think that, but we all know it's not true. You don't know what was the state of mind or what was in Wilson's heart. You are prejudging the man and based on what, Just because he unloaded his weapon into Brown? That is one belief and the other would be that Brown was troubled kid that believed and took advantage of his big size to get what he wanted. In my town, it is the same, peaceful, lot of police families, clean, NO graffiti, safe to walk out at night, not perfect, but still quite safe and nice. Crime rate is low and I think there is a strong family connection and people here bring up their kids with decency and respect, the last murder we had in our town was 87 years ago. We don't have a gang culture where kids feel entitled to steal from others and we don't have schools that are broken down and failing these kids.

The construction workers appear to be Blacks and not whites has reported by some media, as shown in this new CNN video

@zichi: No. It has been confirmed the two construction workers are whites. Their testimony closely matches that of Ms. Piaget, Ms. Mitchell and at least four others who have Brown running away, being shot at, turning around with hands up and then being gunned down to the ground.

Legal experts say it's the most credible and powerful testimony made available to the public. The bystander who recorded the reactions of the two construction workers in real time has added tremendous credibility to their testimony.

We shall see, if that testimony is admitted or not or whether it's even considered credible by the DA.

Very sad that a police officer is willing to kill someone on surrender. That would be serious.

There was no way for Brown to comply with any commands because Wilson did not issue any. One construction worker heard Brown yelling "OK, OK, OK, OK..." as he turned with his hands up. Neither worker, nor any of the eyewitnesses heard Wilson saying anything -- just shooting.

What is most significant, according to police experts, is the three-second pause before Wilson delivered the final four shots. These people are saying that a first-degree murder charge is within the realm of possibility, as a pause that long suggests deliberation.

@zichi

Orange County

@yabits

There was no way for Brown to comply with any commands because Wilson did not issue any. One construction worker heard Brown yelling "OK, OK, OK, OK..." as he turned with his hands up. Neither worker, nor any of the eyewitnesses heard Wilson saying anything -- just shooting.

I have a question for you just out of curiosity. What happens and please don't give me any analytical theories, I just want to know, straight to the point. What happens if officer Wilson is NOT found guilty? Can you and zichi accept it? Can you guys move on or will this consume your lives and you will be devastated beyond all measures. You are so passionate about this to an obsessive point and I am just really curious p, if Wilson walks, if it is found that he was justified for shooting a thug, abusive violent kid, can you guys accept it and move on? I just want a simple answer.

Thank you for that. Yes, Orange County Choppers, good bikes. weird family!

You're confusing that OC with the one in NY. I'm from Southern California-OC

Sorry, but I haven't felt consumed by this story and since it first became available on JT you have probably posted more comments although recently I've posted quite a few too.

Actually, no. I didn't post nearly as much as you or Yabits, that is the reason, I asked the question and I am not taking about THIS particular thread, but overall the Brown incident, but again, you go on this detailed analysis and I just wanted a simple, I'll let it go or I will not. I already know where you and Yabits stand on this issue, but I am really curious if you guys could just move on if the Wilson is NOT charged of anything. It is simple, because you cannot do anything to influence the jury, so once again, could you detach yourself IF Wilson was found NOT guilty of any crime?

What happens if officer Wilson is NOT found guilty?

He can't be found either guilty or not guilty if he doesn't get his day in court.

if Wilson walks, if it is found that he was justified for shooting a thug, abusive violent kid, can you guys accept it and move on? I just want a simple answer.

Back at you, bass; if Wilson gets the day in court that he's entitled to and the verdict is that he's guilty of first-degree murder, of wilfully killing an unarmed teenager standing in the road with his hands up, can you accept that? You've shown more passion in declaring Brown a thug who deserved to be shot dead than anyone has who is asking that the wheels of justice be allowed to turn.

If Wilson gets the day in court that he's entitled to and the verdict is that he's guilty of first-degree murder, of wilfully killing an unarmed teenager standing in the road with his hands up, can you accept that?

No problem. I just want the man to have his day in court, I've always said that from the beginning.

You've shown more passion in declaring Brown a thug who deserved to be shot dead than anyone has who is asking that the wheels of justice be allowed to turn.

I'm asking for justice for the right for Wilson to have a fair trial, nothing more, nothing less. As I always believed, I feel that Brown was responsible for his death. That would have never happened to me, because I don't go around snagging stuff and pushing people and mess with cops-period! If I did that and something happened....like I got shot, that would've been my fault.

@zichi

OJ was arrested, charged and given a trial with a jury. He too was found not guilty of the charges and judging from your comments not a verdict which you have ever agreed with?

I just got hired by NBC when the whole OJ trial took place and was at the courthouse reporting every day for a year, something I will never forget. Yes, he was found NOT guilty, but the cops made a lot of mistakes as well, a lot of the evidence and the crime scene wasn't secure. It was just crazy the entire thing, like a bad circus. I've always believed OJ was guilty based on the evidence. There was no one else. Impossible. But as I heard the verdict, I let it go and I was a young reporter, my job was to report, not give any personal comments. That's a job for the commentators, they get paid for that. After that, I moved on, happily.

Regarding investigations, grand juries and trials, I strongly believe they can and need to be analyzed and evaluated based on at least two parameters: impartiality (freedom from bias and corruption) and competence. Since the OJ trial was mentioned, the LA police found themselves to be grossly incompetent as evidence handlers, witnesses, etc., and thus allowed a guilty man to walk free. (They were corrupt too, as the dishonest Mark Fuhrman, proved.)

I am far more concerned about the system that allows innocent people to be imprisoned for decades at a stretch before some "new" evidence comes along which exonerates them. The only thing is, in many cases, the evidence is not actually new, but was there and not made available because of prosecutorial bias or corruption, or because of incompetence on the part of public defender. I believe the job is up to citizens to perform the analysis and evaluation.

When we have the raw data of two unarmed young men walking in a quiet residential street minding their own business -- and within two minutes later, one of them has had his brains blown out -- something should strike most citizens with alarm. The kid could have been any young man. This is how we want our streets policed? (Some would say "Yes, that's fine." And that reveals a great sickness at the heart of the U.S. today.)

It is clear the Ferguson department is corrupt from the top down, and probably the St. Louis county department is too. The key is the video tape -- I won't call it evidence -- that the police fed the public in order to bias their opinion about the young man their police officer killed in the street -- after initiating a confrontation with him. The chief flatly lied about his motive for releasing the tape, falsely claiming that it was due to FoIA requests from the media. (The store, for it's part, did not want to release the tape, and, through their attorney, expressed shock when the police came to get it.)

Many people are probably OK with a police chief flat out lying in order to release something that serves no purpose other than to attempt to sway public opinion against a murder victim. Especially after the highest law enforcement body in the nation -- the U.S. Department of Justice -- specifically requested the police not to give the tape to the public. But the Ferguson police chief believes he can lie and do whatever he feels like if it will help get what could well be a very bad police officer off the hook. That's hardly impartial, competent, or professional.

I won't be able to judge the entire process until everything transpires. Let's say someone asked me the question this way: "Supposing someone you knew was innocent got railroaded by the system and found guilty. Would you accept the system's verdict and leave it at that?" The answer for me, of course, is "NO." I know full well the system in America is rotten to the core, and rife with a much too high percentage of awful decisions. This is not a condition that any citizen with a conscience and more than half a brain can just "move on" from.

As I always believed, I feel that Brown was responsible for his death.

Yes, you keep saying this. However, Brown did absolutely nothing that deserved getting shot many times and killed. You cannot justify it with anything Brown is alleged to have done. Wilson is supposed to be a public servant. He is supposed to protect and serve the public that pays his salary. He is not supposed to gun down people for relatively minor offenses.

@yabits and zichi

All I asked was a Yes or a No and if you would try to move on and not let this story hinder you and your obsession with this case.

Is it that difficult for you to give me a straight answer?

@slumdog

You have your opinion and I have mine, leave it at that.

Regarding the latest eyewitness testimony coming from two white construction workers with no ties or allegiances to the Ferguson community, along with bystander video of their reaction to the events that they just witnessed:

According to the media experts, this eyewitness testimony was made available to the police investigators within days after the event. This is not something that is just now surfacing for the first time -- except in public. That means, at some point, the investigators have given their OK to release it. My opinion is that they gave the OK because the grand jury is preparing to file charges against Officer Wilson.

I believe Wilson's career as a police officer is over. Based on his family history, if charges are filed, I hope the authorities will consider him for suicide watch. That is how the signals appear to me, and I hope I am wrong regarding any inclination by him to take his own life.

I have found this case, like the Trayvon Martin case, to be another one of those where we catch various Americans in the act of being ourselves. From Day One, when few details were known, I compared it to a "rorschach diagram" where people write their own meanings and perceptions into the unconnected dots.

Now, with the investigation not concluded, some are already asking folks about "moving on." I find the timing of that question very telling and fascinating -- coming directly on the heels of the story of two completely independent white eyewitnesses whose accounting of what they saw backs up the accounts of Michael Brady, Piaget Crenshaw, and Tiffany Mitchell.

The stories told by some: that there are eight eyewitnesses who saw Brown attack Wilson, that many of the eyewitness accounts (backing up the above) have been "proven" to be wrong and eliminated, will be shown in due time to be complete lies. No wonder the interest in "moving on."

We see America's attention riveted and angry about the brutal murders of two journalists by ISIS. And rightfully so. The killing of Michael Brown was every bit as brutal for those who witnessed it. And it happened at high noon on a Saturday on a quiet residential street right in America's heartland. We should not be wanting to "move on." Not yet.

yabits: ... Now, with the investigation not concluded, some are already asking folks about "moving on." ... We see America's attention riveted and angry about the brutal murders of two journalists by ISIS. ...

On Google News' U.S. Edition front page just now, "Ferguson" and "Foley" (one of the beheaded journalists) get zero hits, "Brown" gets two but it's for Chris Brown, ISIS gets two hits but only because the White House is talking about ISIS at the moment, nothing about journalists.

America HAS moved on, until the grand jury lets us know how it went in the Brown case.

@zichi

Strange comment from you claiming I have been obsessed by the story when you have posted twice the number of comments I have made???

Throughout this entire story of multiple threads, No. You and Yabits (more so) go on and on repeating the same thing over and over, it's overkill, I get it, you feel for Brown. I understand, JT is the only place where you can vent and perhaps you can persuade others to agree with your POV when in actuality, it really doesn't matter what any of us believe. We all have our opinions.

I just asked a very simple question and I can't even get that. Yabits keeps on going about eyewitness this and that, timelines etc. and acts as if he was there and knows better the results and outcome than Holder and everyone else that IS involved and working on this case. Anything can happen.

I thought Oscar Pistorius would have been convicted for sure based on the evidence, but he wasn't. Oh, well. OJ wasn't convicted, Oh, well. The could happen to Wilson, but if not, you guys will be ok, believe me. you guys will.

Even statements like this:

We see America's attention riveted and angry about the brutal murders of two journalists by ISIS. And rightfully so.

Yes.

The killing of Michael Brown was every bit as brutal for those who witnessed it. And it happened at high noon on a Saturday on a quiet residential street right in America's heartland. We should not be wanting to "move on." Not yet.

So now you know the state of mind of every American and speak for every American's thought process? I feel for James Foley, but he knew the dangers, the same with the other guy, I found them brave, but Foley was kidnapped NOT ONCE, but TWICE, no one told him to go, he went, he was a brave man, but his luck ran out. He did what he did what he believed and loved and was good at it and had a passion and talent for his work. To lump Brown in the same light is actually insulting to equate the two. One was a Journalist and the other a thug.

And since you guys don't just or cannot give a simple straight answer signifies and tells me, you wouldn't move forward and you wouldn't go on with your lives.

until the grand jury lets us know how it went in the Brown case

In an unusual move, the prosecutor has left all responsibility for charges completely up to the grand jury. Normally, he will explicitly recommend or not recommend charges. I would say the odds are 60/40 at this point the grand jury will do nothing -- leaving things up to the Feds.

@slumdog

You have your opinion and I have mine, leave it at that.

Yes, bass4funk, we both have opinions. However, I am not speaking about opinions. I am speaking about US laws. I believe I am correct when I wrote that Brown did absolutely nothing that deserved getting shot many times and killed. You cannot legally justify it with anything Brown is alleged to have done. You can have the personal opinion that Brown deserved to die if you choose to have that opinion. However, it is not based on the law. It is merely your emotional gut reaction.

Police must be better than that. If the US continues to find itself in the situation where police think they are not legally accountable for their actions, it is a path that will spell misery for all of its citizens, including those who have committed not crimes.

I am speaking about US laws. I believe I am correct when I wrote that Brown did absolutely nothing that deserved getting shot many times and killed.

1) Jaywalking: Certainly not. 2) Theft of cigars: Also not a crime to be met with lethal force 3) Striking a police officer: Only if the officer has reason to believe he or the public is in serious danger. (Striking an officer and running away would not qualify under most legal codes.)

What we have here with the defenders of Wilson is a case of shooting the arrow first and then painting the bull's eye around it. A man has been executed in the street; let's defend the officer by skewing the narrative such that the man legally rated the death penalty. The kicker is that it should be the community that decides whether the death penalty was justified, and it's highly doubtful that Ferguson's community would agree in this particular case, given what eight eyewitnesses have come forward with.

As in this case, and the case in New Iberia, Louisiana -- which the Justice Department is also investigating -- many police departments in the U.S. essentially operate outside of formal laws. If a police officer decides in the heat of the moment, they want to kill a citizen, the odds are extremely high -- purposely stacked in their favor -- they will be able to do so and get away with it. There is a video of a 35-year veteran of the local police force proudly telling a group of "Christians" that he is a "killer" and that all you need to do to get killed by him is to get in his way. This man was supposed to be a leader, a role model, and he's telling this group, with visible relish, that he fully expects to kill again. (He sounds more like a gangster than a police officer.)

I got news for everybody, the justice department will take over the investigation and prosecution of Officer Wilson shortly. The DA in Ferguson is holding a Grand Jury session. Despite the norms, the DA is having Officer Wilson speak with or testify to the Grand Jury ! The only person that is being investigated by the Grand Jury is Wilson for excessive use of force ! It couldn't be Mike Brown he's dead. The subject of the investigation can't defend himself before a Grand Jury, which is designed as a secret one way street for the prosecutor to lay out is evidence against the alleged wrong doer ! This procedure is being flipped on it's head by the prosecutor. Watch the grand jury will return no indictment, then the Fed's will step in and take over ! And that's just the Way it is.

Despite the norms, the DA is having Officer Wilson speak with or testify to the Grand Jury !

Wilson reportedly testified for nearly four hours on Wednesday (17th). Rather than recuse himself, the DA has decided to slough off all responsibility to the panel of the grand jury -- who normally look to a competent DA for guidance on what to charge. The DA made this very unusual decision, obviously, prior to hearing all of the evidence. He doesn't want to charge the officer no matter how incriminating the circumstances. It's simply a ploy to avoid a trial.