Michael Brown Shooting Cont

[Wee baby Shamus]

Was there any link to this SYC?

No link but I watched it on live TV.

[Wee baby Shamus]

I predict that the people trying to explain this distinction to tptwp (hey, is OJ Simpson innocent?) will have as much success as the people who tried to explain to him the difference between rate of traffic stops and number of traffic stops.

I find it funny that you are the 1st one to bring up an OJ comparison.

[awesome possum]

The people who are arguing endlessly with prince, please take note of one fact. When the results were read last night we had multiple people reporting on it. We had the entire internets worth of news sites reporting on it. He went out of his way to inform us of the verdict as reported from FOX NEWS. As in, he was watching/sitting on the Fox site, waiting for the verdict.

This guy has proved every step of the way that he is as close to a rightwing stereotype as one can get without being an editorial cartoon. He has not shown the ability to coherently lay out an argument for anything, let alone the propensity for understanding the arguments being made against his positions. And yet, he is repeatedly engaged.

Why? I'm fascinated as to why so many people seem not just determined but content with arguing against what essentially amounts to Fox News talking points? You're not going to change his mind. He's not proven himself capable enough to change any minds on his own. So why? I have watched people literally spend hours arguing with this guy and accomplishing absolutely nothing and I just want to understand why.

Apologies if it has been discussed, but I wonder why they announced this at night. I feel like night time is more ripe for mischief such as looting and fires + gives people the whole day to get worked up. Why not announce it at like 8 in the morning?

My theory is that they wanted a chance to get people out of work and in their homes. If they'd announced it at 8 in the morning or noon or 5 pm those crowds would have been mixed with a lot of traffic of people trying to get home. The businesses that the piece of hippo dung agitators set fire to would have had employees in it.

Not to mention, it's prime time on television. America has better things to do than pay attention to something like a potential race riot. Not when Monday Night Football and The Voice are on!

Let's ignore the gleeful shitgrins of fox news trolls and talk instead about how staggeringly corrupt this whole thing looks:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/ferguson-michael-brown-indictment-darren-wilson/

And, of course, Prosecutor Bob McCulloch is shady as fuck.

Whole thing is a travesty.

This doesn't get enough attention. There's a reason no one on any side of the argument believed Wilson would be charged with anything, and I know for me at least it's because I believe in this country police must be caught directly on camera breaking the law for even the thought of punishment to start to exist.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

Let's ignore the gleeful shitgrins of fox news trolls and talk instead about how staggeringly corrupt this whole thing looks:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/ferguson-michael-brown-indictment-darren-wilson/

And, of course, Prosecutor Bob McCulloch is shady as fuck.

Whole thing is a travesty.

This really speaks to the core of my deeply conflicted feelings about this whole process.

Grand juries were originally conceived, in early America, as bulwarks against runaway government oppression. They were a group of citizens with an independent power to investigate allegations of criminality, charge indictments independent of the government, and reject government indictments. In many areas where there were no public prosecutors and private prosecutions were the norm, grand juries were the deliberative bodies that determined whether there was enough to go forward with criminal charges.

Since the advent of public prosecutors, this is simply not the case. Many states have abandoned the grand jury system entirely. And in those states where grand juries have been retained, they are widely recognized as rubber-stamps for the local prosecutor's office. Grand jury proceedings today are organized by the Court but run by the Prosecutor's office. They have no real independent investigative capacities, and in the normal case, the local prosecutor's office has 100% control over the evidence that is presented to the grand jury for consideration. The idea that the prosecutor's office would deliberately include exculpatory evidence to the grand jury, in a normal case, is absurd. The prosecutor's office is, normally, actively trying to get an indictment from the grand jury - not vetting all the evidence so they can make an independent decision.

Now, I happen to think that the way grand juries were supposed to work is, in theory, a better system. I would much rather grand juries be independent, presented with all the evidence, and reject a significant number of cases brought before it by the prosecutor's office. But, that's not the way they operate in any state right now.

And that's the problem I have. There are two systems of justice in Ferguson. The overwhelming majority of people being investigated for charges are being done so in a system where the Prosecutor's office is actively looking to indict them. The Prosecutor's office is only providing the grand jury with the version of events that makes them look guilty, and they're actively trying to persuade the grand jury to indict. They're even providing suggested charges for the grand jury to issue the indictments on. The prosecutor's office is presenting a case.

But not Officer Wilson. He faced a grand jury where the Prosecutor's office was not actively looking to indict him. The grand jury hearing his case was told, explicitly, that they were going to give them all the evidence, including the exculpatory evidence, and they were leaving it entirely up to the grand jury to make a decision. They weren't pushing either way and they weren't even going to suggest charges for them to issue. They're NOT presenting a case. They're just dumping all of the evidence on the grand jury and saying "we don't have a dog in this fight."

And my dilemma is that I think this is a better way to do things, and I think that the decision of whether or not to bring charges is BETTER MADE by grand juries who are presented with all the evidence. But this is NOT how things are done for 99.9% of the people being investigated for charges in Ferguson. This is only being done because the person under investigation is a police officer. And that's total bullshit.

[awesome possum]

Da faq?

In what seems to be a serious conflict of interest, a T-shirt being sold to raise money for officer Darren Wilson, who gunned down unarmed teenager Michael Brown in a Ferguson street last month, appears to be associated with the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney, Robert P. McCulloch

“I SUPPORT OFFICER D. WILSON” is an officer inspired design to show support for officer Darren Wilson of the Ferguson Police Department in Missouri. Donations from purchases will be divided between a fund set up for Officer Wilson at gofundme.com as well as The BackStoppers Inc. organization which can be visited at backstoppers.org for more information.

According to an article at stltoday.com, McCulloch is now actually the President of Backstoppers, Inc.

How much more screwed up can this get? The prosecutor in charge of, you know, prosecuting, is the president of an organization that was blatantly selling pro-Wilson merchandise?

Is there no oversight in St. Louis? None at all?

[DanteGabriel]

And my dilemma is that I think this is a better way to do things, and I think that the decision of whether or not to bring charges is BETTER MADE by grand juries who are presented with all the evidence. But this is NOT how things are done for 99.9% of the people being investigated for charges in Ferguson. This is only being done because the person under investigation is a police officer. And that's total bullshit.

I'm pretty steamed about it too. I think I heard that McCulloch has literally never handled a grand jury that way. So a special exception was made for a cop accused of shooting an unarmed teen. This, on top of AP's link about the goddamn T-shirt business, makes me wonder why McCulloch doesn't seem to even care about the appearance of impropriety. Like he's rubbing it in people's faces how much of home-team guy he is.

[Fragile Bird]

I wonder if those are facts the DoJ investigation will make note of?

[Inigima]

Is there a standard set of circumstances that results in the empaneling of a grand jury?

[The Notorious]

DoJ has been crawling all over this for months .... if those issues were improper or illegal, they would had jumped all over the prosecution office already.

It's kinda amazing that nobody so far has been honest enough to admit that their initial assessment of the physical evidences were flat wrong but keep trying to find fault with prosecutorial misconduct.

[The Notorious]

I feel like the people that really care for Michael Brown are at home mourning. The people that just want to destroy stuff are out doing it. I still don't understand how burning businesses and cars in your neighborhood helps anyone.

It doesn't. In a few weeks, the professional protest groups will move on, leaving a wrecked ferguson behind to its citizens with stores and businesses boarded up and the local economy screwed.

[The Reckoner]

So...some people are so outraged at this act of social injustice and implicit racism that they make blanket assumptions by looting and stealing from establishments that're...guilty by association? That's racist, yo.

[Shryke]

Da faq?

How much more screwed up can this get? The prosecutor in charge of, you know, prosecuting, is the president of an organization that was blatantly selling pro-Wilson merchandise?

Is there no oversight in St. Louis? None at all?

You remember when I said McCulloch was a corrupt piece of shit? I wasn't kidding.

This isn't his first time at the rodeo.

[theprincethatwasntpromised]

I can't believe you guys are wasting time explaining this process. It will fall upon deaf ears.

A lot of the responses read like they didn't understand the grand jury process as well, it isn't just about that guy, who I am increasingly convinced is a very successful troll. (Watch me get it wrong, now. I believe I've explained it correctly, though.)

I'm sure homicide departments across America would be overjoyed to hear tptwp's definition I mean if they can't find enough evidence to charge someone then that means no crime was committed so their clearance rate sits at 100%

The people who are arguing endlessly with prince, please take note of one fact. When the results were read last night we had multiple people reporting on it. We had the entire internets worth of news sites reporting on it. He went out of his way to inform us of the verdict as reported from FOX NEWS. As in, he was watching/sitting on the Fox site, waiting for the verdict.

This guy has proved every step of the way that he is as close to a rightwing stereotype as one can get without being an editorial cartoon. He has not shown the ability to coherently lay out an argument for anything, let alone the propensity for understanding the arguments being made against his positions. And yet, he is repeatedly engaged.

Why? I'm fascinated as to why so many people seem not just determined but content with arguing against what essentially amounts to Fox News talking points? You're not going to change his mind. He's not proven himself capable enough to change any minds on his own. So why? I have watched people literally spend hours arguing with this guy and accomplishing absolutely nothing and I just want to understand why.

My theory is that they wanted a chance to get people out of work and in their homes. If they'd announced it at 8 in the morning or noon or 5 pm those crowds would have been mixed with a lot of traffic of people trying to get home. The businesses that the piece of hippo dung agitators set fire to would have had employees in it.

Not to mention, it's prime time on television. America has better things to do than pay attention to something like a potential race riot. Not when Monday Night Football and The Voice are on!

This doesn't get enough attention. There's a reason no one on any side of the argument believed Wilson would be charged with anything, and I know for me at least it's because I believe in this country police must be caught directly on camera breaking the law for even the thought of punishment to start to exist.

You guys shouldn't be mad at me. You should be mad at the liberal media who created the false narrative to begin with.

[Kalbear]

Since you've still failed to understand the actual difference between innocence and not guilty, I don't think the liberal media is to blame.

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

[theprincethatwasntpromised]

Since you've still failed to understand the actual difference between innocence and not guilty, I don't think the liberal media is to blame.

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

It's not going to trial because the jury found his acting justified. You have failed to understand that. I'm actually for cameras on police officers, BTW.

[Kalbear]

It's not going to trial because the jury found his acting justified.

Also no. They failed to find enough evidence to continue with a criminal trial. That does not make it a just shooting. That does not make Wilson innocent. That does not excuse his behavior in any way. All it says is that there was not enough evidence to convict him of committing a crime.

Saying that Wilson is innocent is incorrect.

Saying that Wilson was justified in shooting Brown because of the grand jury shooting is incorrect.

[awesome possum]

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

Cameras would help, but only so much. I was reading a story the other day about four cops who were arrested because they were too dumb to realize that one of them forgot to turn his lapel/dash camera off as the others had. As a result they were caught actively covering up for a cop who rear-ended a woman because he wasn't paying attention. They completely change the story of what happened and created evidence to back it up and then arrested her for DUI.

Again, the only reason they were caught is because one of them forgot to turn his camera off aka what's also known as an "equipment malfunction." There was another story where a man was gunned down and literally all 6 dash cams as well as the lapel cameras of the 8-10 cops on the scene all "malfunctioned" at once, just coincidentally during the 30 seconds in which the shooting took place.

I think Wisconsin is the best example of where to go next. Require all police shootings or incidences of violence to be examined by outside agencies.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

Mandatory GoPros would be a pretty good start, methinks. And an automatic IA investigation anytime one is mysteriously turned off at a seemingly opportune moment.

[The Notorious]

Since you've still failed to understand the actual difference between innocence and not guilty, I don't think the liberal media is to blame.

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

There's a rather lengthy wapo article posted on an earlier thread about the region and its government. It was noted that the only town in the area where there is significantly less racial profiling and arrests of black people were Berkeley, where all the town political power structure was dominated by black people. They still have the same problem with lack of funding which lead to creative uses of the various codes and fees for running a barely functional local government, but winning elections and representing the interest of the majority population of the town seems to work for Berkeley.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

Since you've still failed to understand the actual difference between innocence and not guilty, I don't think the liberal media is to blame.

So guys - how do we fix this? I don't care nearly as much about getting justice for Brown as I do making sure that cops don't shoot black people in absurdly high proportions. How does this get fixed? GoPros on every cop? Significantly more oversight on the police? What will work?

I am in favor of outfitting all police officers with personal cameras that must be activated whenever they interact with the public, but I'm not sure that would have prevented Officer Wilson from shooting Michael Brown.

I think the real issue is that there needs to be a concerted effort for local police departments to focus on "community policing" with individual officers actively embedded in, and interacting with, the communities in which they patrol. I also think there needs to be a concerted effort for police departments to hire officers that reflect the racial diversity of the communities that they patrol. There are enough studies showing discrepancies in how people view and react to people of their own race vs. people of different races to make me believe that we need a strategy for dealing with unconscious racism that acknowledges this is a thing that we may never be able to correct fully with proper training (even if police departments were inclined to institute that training), and that we should be mitigating its effects by trying to make sure that the people who police communities are from and reflect the diversity of those communities.