Michael Brown shooting II

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LTC8K6 said:
But the testimony was shown to be plausible by the pics of the head down runners...
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Football players tend to tackle with their heads up...

Particularly in the past 5 years or so since a big push for doing so started.

At any rate, maybe this will be a case that expidites body cams & mics on all cops.
 
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Tony Stark said:
It was clear to me when they said they were presenting all the evidence that this included some which was in Wilson's favor thus making charges less likely. This was a highly unusual move and not one that a prosecutor who wants charges would make.
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I agree with that. Had this not been the high profile case it was IMO he might have considered it a justified shooting and not put it before a GJ nor pressed any charges.

Given the high profile nature of the case though he had to do SOMETHING, either press charges and take it to trial or put it before a GJ. He chose the latter with the admittedly unusual approach of putting all of the evidence before the GJ.

As I'm sure you know though, juries can be fickle, especially when there's conflicting evidence so I don't think the no indictment outcome was a certainty. Also, with a non-sequestered jury which was aware of the potential civil unrest outcome likely from a non-indictment decision it is possible IMO that a different GJ would have indicted to avoid that.

If you'll recall, there were initially calls for him to recuse himself since his father had been murdered by a black person. If he'd wanted to avoid the case altogether then he could've taken that route.
 
332nd said:
Football players tend to tackle with their heads up...
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Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. In fact the NFL instituted a rule about leading with the crown of the helmet because they believe it causes concussions and was happening too often..

Besides now that I've reread the quote it doesn't mention anything about tackling. Football players sometimes hit their opponents with their head in a downward position, be it tackling, blocking, beating a block or running as a ball carrier.
 
332nd said:
At any rate, maybe this will be a case that expidites body cams & mics on all cops.
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Or we could just trust our police officers when they tell us they were forced to shoot someone we know for a fact had just come from a violent felony, and when said officer has clear signs of having been attacked in his vehicle?

When did we become a society that defaults to trusting the violent criminals and doubting the sworn police officers who keep us safe from them?
 
Iamafalser said:
I agree with that. Had this not been the high profile case it was IMO he might have considered it a justified shooting and not put it before a GJ nor pressed any charges.

Given the high profile nature of the case though he had to do SOMETHING, either press charges and take it to trial or put it before a GJ. He chose the latter with the admittedly unusual approach of putting all of the evidence before the GJ.
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Agreed.

As I'm sure you know though, juries can be fickle, especially when there's conflicting evidence so I don't think the no indictment outcome was a certainty. Also, with a non-sequestered jury which was aware of the potential civil unrest outcome likely from a non-indictment decision it is possible IMO that a different GJ would have indicted to avoid that.
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No, I suppose a no bill wasn't a certainty. It is near certain that he could have got an indictment if that's what he wanted though.

If you'll recall, there were initially calls for him to recuse himself since his father had been murdered by a black person. If he'd wanted to avoid the case altogether then he could've taken that route.
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My guess is that he figured a special prosecutor would try his best to get a trial (and thus almost certainly get one) and stayed on to reduce the chances of that happening.
 
Tony Stark said:
It is near certain that he could have got an indictment if that's what he wanted though.
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Agreed. In this case cherry-picking witnesses/evidence against a probable cause burden of proof standard isn't a high hurdle. But then he'd have to try it in court and he was well aware of the entire scope of evidence. With the physical evidence and the conflicting witness testimony I don't think a decent Wilson defense team would have too much difficulty creating reasonable doubt in the minds of jurors. (And tonight would've just happened X months later.)

Is the no bill decision the outcome he wanted? Given his behavior IMO that is very possible.
 
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LTC8K6 said:
Again, I think it's important to point out that McCulloch did not make the GJ presentation.
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I dunno that it matters. He's the one that made the decision to present the case to a grand jury and to do it the way it was.
 
I love it, Huffington Post blazing across their headlines:

"U.S. Attorneys Prosecuted 162,000 Cases In 2010 – Grand Juries Declined To Indict Just 11 Times..."

and they link to an article titled:

"It’s Incredibly Rare For A Grand Jury To Do What Ferguson’s Just Did"

And of course the narrative at both locations is that there is something fishy and wrong about them not indicting.

I just have to say that there is something profoundly twisted about an out of control, race-baiting, sensationalist media stirring the pot and pushing for the DA to "do something!" and then when the DA puts on a show grand jury when no indictment or action against Wilson of any kind was ever warranted... to appease them and the public... to get the evidence out there...

Then they turn around and use the very fact that THEY created an unusual and inappropriate situation as evidence of impropriety.

Unbelievable.

It'd be like me handing a piece of Monopoly money to my friend and insisting he try it in the vending machine despite his protests that it wasn't real money and the machine wouldn't accept it, and then when he acquiesced and put the Monopoly money into the vending machine... and sure enough, it was spat back out... I then went on a rant about how unusual it is for the machine not to take money and dispense a soda, angrily making it clear I blamed my friend for not having his heart in it, and clearly sabotaging it somehow deliberately to cheat me out of the soda I wanted...
 
Skeptic Tank said:
I love it, Huffington Post blazing across their headlines:

"U.S. Attorneys Prosecuted 162,000 Cases In 2010 – Grand Juries Declined To Indict Just 11 Times..."

and they link to an article titled:

"It’s Incredibly Rare For A Grand Jury To Do What Ferguson’s Just Did"

And of course the narrative at both locations is that there is something fishy and wrong about them not indicting.

I just have to say that there is something profoundly twisted about an out of control, race-baiting, sensationalist media stirring the pot and pushing for the DA to "do something!" and then when the DA puts on a show grand jury when no indictment or action against Wilson of any kind was ever warranted... to appease them and the public... to get the evidence out there...

Then they turn around and use the very fact that THEY created an unusual and inappropriate situation as evidence of impropriety.

Unbelievable.

It'd be like me handing a piece of Monopoly money to my friend and insisting he try it in the vending machine despite his protests that it wasn't real money and the machine wouldn't accept it, and then when he acquiesced and put the Monopoly money into the vending machine... and sure enough, it was spat back out... I then went on a rant about how unusual it is for the machine not to take money and dispense a soda, angrily making it clear I blamed my friend for not having his heart in it, and clearly sabotaging it somehow deliberately to cheat me out of the soda I wanted...
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I agree...

It is pretty clear that this wasn't a serious attempt at securing an indictment and was done so he could say that it was a grand jury who made the decision. None of this proves that he's covering anything up though. And in fact, if he was, releasing evidence and transcripts seems like an odd way to do it when it could all be kept secret as is usually the case.
 
Tony Stark said:
I agree...

It is pretty clear that this wasn't a serious attempt at securing an indictment and was done so he could say that it was a grand jury who made the decision. None of this proves that he's covering anything up though. And in fact, if he was, releasing evidence and transcripts seems like an odd way to do it when it could all be kept secret as is usually the case.
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I think that knowing the evidence he was well aware that there was no case. Using a GJ and giving them all the evidence is the sensible move, the alternative was to give them cherry picked evidence and then have the case laughed out of a real court.
 
Cain said:
Was 7:00 p.m. the best time for this announcement? Is there any research on how to time these things?
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As a parent of two young children, one of whom was walking distance from one of the protests last night. It absolutly was the best time for the announcement. I had my family together in one place and didn't have to navigate the chaos to try to get us all together.

It's the one thing that was handled correctly last night.
 
alfaniner said:
I saw the looting of the liquor store last night. People make me *********** sick sometimes.
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They're idiots. Fox News had video of people driving up to a store and piling stuff in the trunk. Their license plates were visible on the footage.

I have little doubt that there are people who were just waiting for the GJ report to do some Xmas shopping.
 
I don't condone the rioting at all but understand the frustrations.

I'd think the responsible action would be to emphasis to new police recruits to use non lethal force as the 1st option.
 
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