Michael Brown Shooting

[Dietrich]

The same argument was used in the 1960's during the violence that accompanied the civil rights movement. How far have you come, baby?

 

The fact that an argument was used fifty years ago does not make it incorrect or irrelevant now.

 

I tend to agree with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's views as expressed in this article http://time.com/3132635/ferguson-coming-race-war-class-warfare/

 

Class warfare is what we should be contemplating not race war.

 

...part of me wants to agree wholeheartedly, and part of me wants to argue against this as strongly as I can. I keep trying to type a coherent response, but I can't. Race and class, I think, are inextricably interrelated; it's very difficult to examine one entirely independently of the other, because the other will always be a confounding factor in any such examination.

[VanSputia]

Belisarius hit the nail on the head. Any time a police officer kills a civilian, there should be an indictment.

 

That's so illogical. But I suppose liberals believe all law enforcement have a wishlist to go out and kill people, right? 

(However, I believe the lack of training resulted in this officers death.)

But I'm sure with your logic, the officer would have been wrong had he got the final shot in, correct? 

So when people do this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggas9eVGKsk

I hope you understand why I would much rather the LEO fire first. And make it count, too. Because LEO's are the target nowadays. Not some black thug trying to rob stores and assault cops. 

 

 

I think looking at this from a legal perspective, based on the precedent from previous supreme court decisions, it's simply not justified to shoot Brown 6 times. 

 

Easy to call judgment on something when you've never experienced it. 

 

I typed "Michael Brown Jury Ev" and "Michael Brown is Israel Evil Occupier". Do I even want to know? 

 

EDIT: I was talking with a friend through texts. I would post the whole thing, but it is on my phone (I'm on my PC). Basically, a chest cam (like a GoPro) could avoid the whole thing... Just the cost. I quick checked the BLS for police and sheriffs and got around $95,307,000 for everyone. I did not check what the BLS defined as police/sheriffs, whether or not they accounted for feds, and all of that. Still, with those, eventually we will make up that in legal fees, but we might need to upgrade them, replace the batteries, replacing broken cameras, etc. 

www.usdebtclock.org

 

It seems like that would work better, but imagery isn't everything. It's about the tension of the situation, what the officer sees (which can't be exactly shown on a camera with a straight forward optical), the small noises inaudible to a small recording device, the reaction time and the heat of the moment, whether the officer can survive the attack with nonlethal choice. 

Edited November 30, 2014 by VanSputia

[WISD0MTREE]

(However, I believe the lack of training resulted in this officers death.)

 

It seems like that would work better, but imagery isn't everything. It's about the tension of the situation, what the officer sees (which can't be exactly shown on a camera with a straight forward optical), the small noises inaudible to a small recording device, the reaction time and the heat of the moment, whether the officer can survive the attack with nonlethal choice. 

Probably the difference in training. The guy was ex-military going against a traffic cop. If that same officer was going against a street thug, the thug would probably be bagged. 

 

Cameras are still a good place to start. 

[VanSputia]

Probably the difference in training. The guy was ex-military going against a traffic cop. If that same officer was going against a street thug, the thug would probably be bagged. 

 

Cameras are still a good place to start. 

 

Any and all LEO's are suppose to be trained to handle anything that they may encounter on the streets. But that's for another argument, another time.  

Cameras are..sort of..a good place to start. In this incident, a camera would have done mighty fine, and truly shown what happened. 

[Hereno]

they're defending the cop because they have this view in their mind of how black people act that they're ascribing to michael brown

 

he's a "thug" and he's a "thief" and charged the cop with his face looking mean and angry, pretending to have a gun in his waistband, and wouldn't even stop after being shot three times but was apparently completely not even affected

 

and this all happened in 10 feet of distance? with the cop taking a break and demanding the dude stop some more, before shooting him in the top of the head?

 

the people who believe this !@#$ are just scared idiots looking for any reason to not have to consider reality

 

the cop could have literally said he was like the incredible hulk and they'd still thi--- oh wait, that actually happened, he actually did describe it that way

 

it is a defense mechanism for their !@#$ white world-view and their prejudices against the black community

 

meanwhile, i have yet to see ITT anybody talking about how the prosecutor in this case is the president of an organization which raises money for cops and sold "i stand with officer wilson" t-shirts to raise money for his defense campaign

 

i've yet to see anybody talk about the fact that the store owner doesn't even think it was michael brown who robbed him

 

and yet we've all seen the video, why? because, as bill o'reilly stated, "this changes everything"

 

you're right, nameless idiot with a grover cleveland avatar - i am indeed a rebel against a system wherein millions of people justify murder because the victim was a black man and the perpetrator was - or so they think - just like them

Edited November 30, 2014 by Hereno

[VanSputia]

I consider reality Hereno, and it seems you're blinded by it. Racism is alive and well in America my friends. It's very alive.

[Dietrich]

It seems like that would work better, but imagery isn't everything. It's about the tension of the situation, what the officer sees (which can't be exactly shown on a camera with a straight forward optical), the small noises inaudible to a small recording device, the reaction time and the heat of the moment, whether the officer can survive the attack with nonlethal choice. 

 

You're right, but video evidence would at least help to determine some more of the basic, indisputable facts of the situation, which we can't know without such evidence. For example, if Brown had his hands up and was at a great distance from Wilson, then that tells us that Wilson definitely had a lapse of good judgement when he shot Brown; if, however, Brown was attempting to charge Wilson while taking bullets without surrendering, then that tells us that Wilson was without a reasonable doubt absolutely justified in his actions. There are a lot of less obvious situations, one of which is probably what really happened, but video evidence would nonetheless be invaluable in teasing out the facts of the situation, which I'm sure you will agree are at least as important as less easily discernible factors like the heat of the moment and the necessity that police officers react quickly to developments in the situation in lest they be prevented from reacting at all.

 

he's a "thug" and he's a "thief" and charged the cop with his face looking mean and angry, pretending to have a gun in his waistband, and wouldn't even stop after being shot three times but was apparently completely not even affected

 

Again, nobody claimed that Brown was pretending to have a gun in his waistband. There could have been any number of reasons that his hand was at his waistband; for example, as mentioned earlier, if his pants were baggy, he may have been attempting to hold them up. Additionally, in the heat of the moment, human beings can in fact take multiple bullet wounds and continue to operate relatively unhindered for a short period of time. Since the violence between Brown and Wilson lasted a very short period of time indeed, it doesn't seem unreasonable that Brown was still operating at near-full capacity after receiving several bullet wounds.

 

and this all happened in 10 feet of distance? with the cop taking a break and demanding the dude stop some more, before shooting him in the top of the head?

 

Nobody claimed that. Wilson estimated that Brown began more or less thirty feet away from him, and advanced more or less ten feet before stopping, though we know now that this estimate was obviously inaccurate based on the physical evidence available. In addition, Wilson never claimed to have taken a break; he paused "a second", which taken literally isn't much of a break, but taken figuratively may have been even less, with Wilson shouting his order to stop and get on the ground as quickly as possible before shooting in defense of his own safety.

 

the cop could have literally said he was like the incredible hulk and they'd still thi--- oh wait, that actually happened, he actually did describe it that way

 

That's... a very significant manipulation of what Wilson actually said. He happened to use language that many people in the U.S. associate with the Incredible Hulk, but that doesn't mean that he was actually attempting to claim that Brown was the Incredible Hulk. I tend to believe that he used the best language available to him to describe what he remembered; he was reciting his testimony with little or no rehearsal shortly after the situation occurred, so it's unlikely that he had access to a dictionary or a thesaurus at the time.

 

I consider reality Hereno, and it seems you're blinded by it. Racism is alive and well in America my friends. It's very alive.

 

I love how the police officer is trying to talk and the angry liberal woman in the crowd ignores what he says and shouts at him about how he is a victim of oppression and race is all that matters. That video is very demonstrative of U.S. society today; anyone looking to have a reasonable discussion is silenced by the shrieks of intellectually intolerant, politically indoctrinated drones.

[Hereno]

Again, nobody claimed that Brown was pretending to have a gun in his waistband.

Wilson did.

 

Nobody claimed that. Wilson estimated that Brown began more or less thirty feet away from him, and advanced more or less ten feet before stopping, though we know now that this estimate was obviously inaccurate based on the physical evidence available. In addition, Wilson never claimed to have taken a break; he paused "a second", which taken literally isn't much of a break, but taken figuratively may have been even less, with Wilson shouting his order to stop and get on the ground as quickly as possible before shooting in defense of his own safety.

Wilson did.

 

Glad we're on the same page.

 

That's... a very significant manipulation of what Wilson actually said. He happened to use language that many people in the U.S. associate with the Incredible Hulk, but that doesn't mean that he was actually attempting to claim that Brown was the Incredible Hulk. I tend to believe that he used the best language available to him to describe what he remembered; he was reciting his testimony with little or no rehearsal shortly after the situation occurred, so it's unlikely that he had access to a dictionary or a thesaurus at the time.

Keep in mind that Wilson is 6'4.

[Fox Fire]

The whole point is: There was no reason to shoot the kid.

Sure, he acted lawfully. But an officer can easily shoot anyone and then say whatever he wants in his own defense. Legally speaking, It's not murder if it's committed by the state, after all. Never is. Sadly, the only person who got to speak their story was the one who isn't dead.

 

Legality has little to do with whether something is right or wrong.

[Grillick]

 

That's so illogical. But I suppose liberals believe all law enforcement have a wishlist to go out and kill people, right? 

(However, I believe the lack of training resulted in this officers death.)

But I'm sure with your logic, the officer would have been wrong had he got the final shot in, correct? 

So when people do this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggas9eVGKsk

I hope you understand why I would much rather the LEO fire first. And make it count, too. Because LEO's are the target nowadays. Not some black thug trying to rob stores and assault cops. 

 

Actually, it's not illogical. The fact that you think it is, and your rhetoric in response to my assertion, demonstrates that you have no idea what it actually means to charge someone with a crime. Law enforcement officers (LEOs) are specially-trained members of our society who are tasked with important duties to enforce the law, protect the community, and investigate crimes. While I believe that such duties never require the use of lethal force, I understand that the majority of society disagrees with me and believes that, in certain situations, the use of lethal force by a LEO is justified. Understanding that occasionally the use of lethal force is justified, I still believe that it should be discouraged, and so I believe that every time a LEO uses lethal force that results in a fatality, a complete investigation should be conducted and a jury drawn from the LEO's community should determine whether or not that LEO's use of force was justified in that circumstance.

 

For reference, "a jury drawn from the LEO's community" determining "whether or not that LEO's use of force was justified in that circumstance" is a pretty basic definition of a legal concept called a "trial." A "trial" is what occurs after an indictment, which is what a grand jury is asked to issue. In contrast, a grand jury's function is to determine whether a crime has been committed, and whether the prosecutor has sufficient evidence to charge an individual with that crime. It is not an appropriate venue for weighing the proposed defendant's defenses.

 

If there had been an indictment, I believe (based on the evidence that was presented to the grand jury) there is a good chance that Wilson would have been acquitted after a trial. But I have too much respect for the integrity of our criminal justice system to believe that the procedural aspects of it can be done away with just because we like the end result. It is far too easy to devolve into a liberal/conservative talking points argument, but my objection to the grand jury in this case has very little to do with my political beliefs, and even less to do with whether I think Darren Wilson's use of force was justified.

 

As to your last comment, that's simply false. In 2011, out of 698,460 police officers in the United States [source], 179 died in the line of duty [source] (which includes deaths from illness, accident, and natural disaster. This represents a mortality rate of 25.6 per 100,000 (this mortality rate was a high in recent years [source]). If you exclude illness, accidents, and natural disasters, the duty-related mortality rate for police officers in 2011 was 17.5 per 100,000. The homicide victimization rate for black males in the United States in 2011 was 31.7 per 100,000, and for black Americans as a whole, it was 17.5 per 100,000 [source]. Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to imply that most of the killings of black males are committed by police officers, but it is simply false to say that the police are more of a target than "black thugs."

 

Moreover, being a police officer is not substantially more dangerous than being alive: a dead police officer is not significantly more likely to have been murdered than any other dead person [source].

 

Please, let's try to keep this discussion about what it's really about. This isn't (or at least, it shouldn't be) a debate over whether Darren Wilson was guilty of murder. The issue here is whether a grand jury, whose purpose is to weigh the strongest case the prosecution can put forward (a defendant, importantly, does not have a constitutional right to be heard by the grand jury, or even to be present during the proceedings), and determine, based on that, whether there was sufficient evidence that a reasonable jury might have convicted him. Whenever we are presented with a dead citizen, especially one who was unarmed, and it is undisputed that the dead citizen was killed by the intentional discharge of the police officer's weapon, there is sufficient evidence right there that a reasonable jury might find the police officer guilty of murder.

 

I don't understand why this is even a question.

[Fox Fire]

That video is very demonstrative of U.S. society today; anyone looking to have a reasonable discussion is silenced by the shrieks of intellectually intolerant, politically indoctrinated drones.

I thought that was all societies.

[naTia]

I feel like any good discussion will be silenced by people who do not know the facts. We can't have good discussion based on media speculation. All of the evidence provided has not been given to us from both sides in a civil manner.

[Dietrich]

Wilson did.

 

Again, from what I know - which is based off of news articles and whatnot, not the actual testimony, which I haven't read through - Wilson claimed that Brown was about thirty feet away, and that he touched or grabbed his waistband while charging. I don't recall Wilson claiming that Brown ever came within ten feet of him after fleeing the police car, and I certainly don't recall him explicitly claiming that he believed Wilson to be armed. That may have been what he thought at the time - which is understandable, considering that it was a stressful situation and Wilson didn't have all of the facts then that we have now - but he didn't explicitly say so in his testimony.

 

Keep in mind that Wilson is 6'4.

 

 That's a fair point.

 

That said, I'm now wondering if there's any reason that, assuming that Wilson's testimony is true, he couldn't or shouldn't have tried to subdue Brown physically before resorting to any potentially lethal action. There's the possibility that Wilson might have had a gun or a knife, and I suppose also the possibility that his friend might intervene in his favor, but I'd be interested to know whether or not police officers are trained to respond in a particular manner to situations like this (i.e., when they should and shouldn't use their firearms when being physically assaulted). Surely there must be some protocol.

 

If there had been an indictment, I believe (based on the evidence that was presented to the grand jury) there is a good chance that Wilson would have been acquitted after a trial. But I have too much respect for the integrity of our criminal justice system to believe that the procedural aspects of it can be done away with just because we like the end result. It is far too easy to devolve into a liberal/conservative talking points argument, but my objection to the grand jury in this case has very little to do with my political beliefs, and even less to do with whether I think Darren Wilson's use of force was justified.

 

...

 

Please, let's try to keep this discussion about what it's really about. This isn't (or at least, it shouldn't be) a debate over whether Darren Wilson was guilty of murder. The issue here is whether a grand jury, whose purpose is to weigh the strongest case the prosecution can put forward (a defendant, importantly, does not have a constitutional right to be heard by the grand jury, or even to be present during the proceedings), and determine, based on that, whether there was sufficient evidence that a reasonable jury might have convicted him. Whenever we are presented with a dead citizen, especially one who was unarmed, and it is undisputed that the dead citizen was killed by the intentional discharge of the police officer's weapon, there is sufficient evidence right there that a reasonable jury might find the police officer guilty of murder.

 

I don't understand why this is even a question.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with essentially everything here. There's no reason not to conduct a full trial to determine the facts of the case and issue an authoritative guilty or not guilty verdict; after all, if Wilson is not guilty (which I tend to believe), then what harm will be done?

 

The only reasonable argument against this that I can see is that a full trial will probably cost huge amounts of money in legal fees paid by both Wilson's and Brown's representatives, but then we get into a lot of messy moral and philosophical questions that I'm not sure I even have an opinion on.

 

I thought that was all societies.

 

I can only speak conclusively for the society I've grown up in, but perhaps you're right.

[Fox Fire]

I feel like any good discussion will be silenced by people who do not know the facts. We can't have good discussion based on media speculation. All of the evidence provided has not been given to us from both sides in a civil manner.

We all know the officer knew he was unarmed. That's all the reason I need to know that killing him was irresponsible. Legal? Sure. Right? !@#$ no.

[Ayayay]

I thought that was all societies.

Nah, in the Middle East you get shot and killed instead

[Dietrich]

We all know the officer knew he was unarmed. That's all the reason I need to know that killing him was irresponsible. Legal? Sure. Right? !@#$ no.

 

Did Wilson ever explicitly say that he knew Brown was unarmed? I was under the impression that at some point he may have believed that Brown was armed.

[Hereno]

Again, from what I know - which is based off of news articles and whatnot

then you need to stop talking about shit when you don't know what it is that you're talking about

 

not to be a dick, and at least you're being honest about it, but yeah

 

go up and read the article i posted; it has the claim quoted in it. it can pretty !@#$ing obviously be reasoned that a person does not have a gun if they're trying to grab yours, but he additionally claimed that brown "put his hand in his waistband" (ie. as if it were a gun or whatever) before charging the officer

 

what possible reason would he have for doing that, given we know now as well that he is not armed?

[Hereno]

also, it should be noted that wilson didn't have a taser on hand because he didn't like the way it felt when he wore it

 

grade a cop right here

 

depriving himself of the tools needed to do the job because it is uncomfortable

 

this is what you get when you scrape the bottom of the barrel for anyone with a high school diploma to become police

[Fox Fire]

Did Wilson ever explicitly say that he knew Brown was unarmed? I was under the impression that at some point he may have believed that Brown was armed.

Let's see, he's responding to a strong-armed robbery, he has a brief struggle with Brown and it all builds up to him getting out of his car with his gun drawn. As he is doing that, Brown is fleeing, then stops and turns around. Regardless of where his hands were, he wouldnt have waited until this point to use a weapon. In fact, if Brown was armed, Wilson would have been responding to an armed robbery. I don't think there was any rational reason for Wilson to ever believe he was armed.

[WISD0MTREE]

Nah, in the Middle East you get shot and killed instead

Or car bombed... 

 

Let's see, he's responding to a strong-armed robbery, he has a brief struggle with Brown and it all builds up to him getting out of his car with his gun drawn. As he is doing that, Brown is fleeing, then stops and turns around. Regardless of where his hands were, he wouldnt have waited until this point to use a weapon. In fact, if Brown was armed, Wilson would have been responding to an armed robbery. I don't think there was any rational reason for Wilson to ever believe he was armed.

Let me fix that phrase for you. 

Brown was resisting arrest. 

[Grillick]

Let me fix that phrase for you. 

Brown was resisting arrest. 

What relevance does this have to the reasonableness of Wilson's use of lethal force? Is resisting arrest a capital crime now? Have we dispensed with the legal system and appointed our local police officers judge, jury, and executioner? If so, why doesn't he have a cool helmet like Judge Dredd?

[Ayayay]

What relevance does this have to the reasonableness of Wilson's use of lethal force? Is resisting arrest a capital crime now? Have we dispensed with the legal system and appointed our local police officers judge, jury, and executioner? If so, why doesn't he have a cool helmet like Judge Dredd?

Have you seen how much cool helmets costs these days? It's so ridiculous, I just want to riot.

[Dietrich]

A quick correction to something that I wrote earlier: after reading Wilson's testimony before the grand jury (he is sworn in on page 195, if anyone is interested in reading ninety pages of his testimony), I learned that he did in fact claim to have run a significant distance in pursuit of Brown, which could very well explain the difference between his claim that Brown died ten or twenty feet in front of him and the evidence that Brown died one hundred and fifty feet away from his police car. However, he also claimed that he felt like a five-year-old fighting Hulk Hogan (although not, I feel it relevant to note, the Incredible Hulk) when Brown assaulted him through the window of his police car, which seems strange to me considering that he's a pretty big guy himself at 6'4" and 210 pounds, although to be fair, Brown was larger than him by a substantial margin.

 

go up and read the article i posted; it has the claim quoted in it. it can pretty !@#$ obviously be reasoned that a person does not have a gun if they're trying to grab yours, but he additionally claimed that brown "put his hand in his waistband" (ie. as if it were a gun or whatever) before charging the officer

what possible reason would he have for doing that, given we know now as well that he is not armed?

 

I read the article that you posted, which has been the source of most of my comments regarding Wilson's testimony.

 

Anyway, I obviously don't know exactly what Wilson was thinking in terms of how Brown may have been armed; I can only speculate that Brown may have put his hand at his waistband for any number of reasons (holding up baggy pants, as mentioned earlier, is the most obvious possible reason outside of him being armed or wishing to appear armed, the former of which we know is untrue and the latter of which, as you mentioned, makes little sense), and that Wilson may have rapidly inferred from that motion that Brown had a gun, or a knife, or a club, or any number of potentially dangerous objects, which upon further reflection (after Brown's death) he realized was untrue. This doesn't justify Brown's death by any means, but to me it at least provides a viable explanation for Wilson's actions.

 

One could always question whether Brown actually did what Wilson says that he did, of course, but there is witness corroboration of most of his claims (not that that means much here; there's a witness in this case to corroborate just about any story you want to come up with, it seems).

 

also, it should be noted that wilson didn't have a taser on hand because he didn't like the way it felt when he wore it

 

I did happen to read that last night (after posting, since I decided to go and read the transcript of Wilson's testimony before the grand jury), which makes me question his competence somewhat. It is worth noting that he said that there were only a limited number of tasers available, but then he went on to say that there was usually one available if he wanted one, which as I see it could be interpreted in two ways: firstly, and most obviously, it means that his primary reason for declining to carry a taser most of the time was discomfort, which I agree isn't a good excuse at all; but secondly, it means that most police officers using the same equipment stockpile as Wilson also declined to carry a taser most of the time.

 

My number one question at this point is why tasers are apparently in such limited supply, as I was under the impression that they were a standard piece of equipment for police officers.

 

Let's see, he's responding to a strong-armed robbery, he has a brief struggle with Brown and it all builds up to him getting out of his car with his gun drawn. As he is doing that, Brown is fleeing, then stops and turns around. Regardless of where his hands were, he wouldnt have waited until this point to use a weapon. In fact, if Brown was armed, Wilson would have been responding to an armed robbery. I don't think there was any rational reason for Wilson to ever believe he was armed.

 

Wilson wasn't responding to any robbery at all; he simply happened to see Brown and his friend wandering down the middle of the road illegally, and asked them to move to the sidewalk. They refused. Only then did Wilson realize that they matched the description of the robbers. He attempted to open his door to get out and stop them while another police car was on its way, and Brown closed the door and assaulted him through the window, to which Wilson responded by attempting to shoot Brown, since he determined that he had no other means available to protect his safety. Then Brown flees and Wilson gives chase, shouting for him to stop, until Brown turns and prepares to charge Wilson, moving his hand to his waistband at this point in time.

 

I don't think that it's unreasonable for Wilson to have, at that moment in time, considered the possibility that Brown might be armed with some deadly weapon or another (i.e., a knife). There were literally seconds and fractions of seconds to think between each action that had to be taken, leaving little time for thought; while I can't say that I believe Brown's death was justified, I can say that I believe that Wilson did his best to respond appropriately to what had become a fast-paced, very stressful situation.

[Fox Fire]

A quick correction to something that I wrote earlier: after reading Wilson's testimony before the grand jury (he is sworn in on page 195, if anyone is interested in reading ninety pages of his testimony), I learned that he did in fact claim to have run a significant distance in pursuit of Brown, which could very well explain the difference between his claim that Brown died ten or twenty feet in front of him and the evidence that Brown died one hundred and fifty feet away from his police car. However, he also claimed that he felt like a five-year-old fighting Hulk Hogan (although not, I feel it relevant to note, the Incredible Hulk) when Brown assaulted him through the window of his police car, which seems strange to me considering that he's a pretty big guy himself at 6'4" and 210 pounds, although to be fair, Brown was larger than him by a substantial margin.

 

 

I read the article that you posted, which has been the source of most of my comments regarding Wilson's testimony.

 

Anyway, I obviously don't know exactly what Wilson was thinking in terms of how Brown may have been armed; I can only speculate that Brown may have put his hand at his waistband for any number of reasons (holding up baggy pants, as mentioned earlier, is the most obvious possible reason outside of him being armed or wishing to appear armed, the former of which we know is untrue and the latter of which, as you mentioned, makes little sense), and that Wilson may have rapidly inferred from that motion that Brown had a gun, or a knife, or a club, or any number of potentially dangerous objects, which upon further reflection (after Brown's death) he realized was untrue. This doesn't justify Brown's death by any means, but to me it at least provides a viable explanation for Wilson's actions.

 

One could always question whether Brown actually did what Wilson says that he did, of course, but there is witness corroboration of most of his claims (not that that means much here; there's a witness in this case to corroborate just about any story you want to come up with, it seems).

 

 

I did happen to read that last night (after posting, since I decided to go and read the transcript of Wilson's testimony before the grand jury), which makes me question his competence somewhat. It is worth noting that he said that there were only a limited number of tasers available, but then he went on to say that there was usually one available if he wanted one, which as I see it could be interpreted in two ways: firstly, and most obviously, it means that his primary reason for declining to carry a taser most of the time was discomfort, which I agree isn't a good excuse at all; but secondly, it means that most police officers using the same equipment stockpile as Wilson also declined to carry a taser most of the time.

 

My number one question at this point is why tasers are apparently in such limited supply, as I was under the impression that they were a standard piece of equipment for police officers.

 

 

Wilson wasn't responding to any robbery at all; he simply happened to see Brown and his friend wandering down the middle of the road illegally, and asked them to move to the sidewalk. They refused. Only then did Wilson realize that they matched the description of the robbers. He attempted to open his door to get out and stop them while another police car was on its way, and Brown closed the door and assaulted him through the window, to which Wilson responded by attempting to shoot Brown, since he determined that he had no other means available to protect his safety. Then Brown flees and Wilson gives chase, shouting for him to stop, until Brown turns and prepares to charge Wilson, moving his hand to his waistband at this point in time.

 

I don't think that it's unreasonable for Wilson to have, at that moment in time, considered the possibility that Brown might be armed with some deadly weapon or another (i.e., a knife). There were literally seconds and fractions of seconds to think between each action that had to be taken, leaving little time for thought; while I can't say that I believe Brown's death was justified, I can say that I believe that Wilson did his best to respond appropriately to what had become a fast-paced, very stressful situation.

No, he was responding to a strong-armed robbery, a call which came over dispatch.... The entire reason he stopped Brown to begin with.

Regardless of what happened, we know for a fact thats why he stopped him, and there was no rational reason to believe he was armed at any point in time.

Edited December 2, 2014 by Fox Fire

[Dietrich]

No, he was responding to a strong-armed robbery, a call which came over dispatch.... The entire reason he stopped Brown to begin with.

Regardless of what happened, we know for a fact thats why he stopped him ...

 

That is... entirely inaccurate. Where in the world are you getting your information?