Michael Brown shooting II

[Nihilianth]

Moving back towards Wilson made him a threat and the witnesses that saw this part say Brown was charging Wilson, which is consistent with Wilson's account, the positions of the casings and the audio of the last ten shots.

Yeah, the audio, combined with how far away from the first blood splatters the body was....is pretty damning. The audio is what convinced me. The gun was fired in pretty rapid succession. For a person to move 20 feet in that short a time after being first shot, means he must have been moving.

 

[plague311]

Remember when he made that macaroni art thing and momma hung it on the fridge and he gave her a big hug and said, "I lurve you, momma." It was so cute, how he mispronounce "love" like that. Later, he shared his gummy bears with his sister, which was nice.

I suppose I'll have to dredge up some video evidence to confirm that at least once in his life, Michael Brown acted with humanity and kindness. I'll have to check my back-up hard drive though.

Oh wait. I don't really need video evidence do I? Just trust my testimony. Pretend I'm a cop.

All snark aside, it's possible that at times Michael Brown was an amazing human being. He could have been caring, loving, and a complete angel....at times. We all can be. The only point is that he certainly wasn't on that specific day. That isn't decided by one specific action, it is decided by a chain of events.

I get a kick out of people saying "why would Brown do x" or "why would Brown do y, I certainly wouldn't have and it's not sensible."

Answer me, how many of Browns other actions are sensible to you? Would you steal from a store if you wanted something? Would you intimidate the owner to get what you want? Would you walk down the middle of the road for no other reason than you wanted too? Despite Mumbles...analysis of the sidewalk condition, they were in perfect shape. You can see it from all the pictures.

Would you refuse to get out of the road when told to by a police officer? Would you, despite davefoc weird insinuation that it's understandable, attack a police officer? I know I certainly wouldn't, and my parents never EVER taught me to do anything remotely close. I also have never even thought of teaching my children the same. To imply something like that is madness to me.

Think of all the things Michael Brown did that day, not as individual events, but as a series of events that led to the conclusion. At the end of that, sit back and ask, "Were any, or even most, of his decisions that he made that day the decisions of a rational or clear thinking man?"

I have openly stated that it is tragic that this man lost his life. I don't know what caused him to reach this level of indecency. It has nothing to do with his skin color, that much I do know. I wish he were alive so we could ask him questions, and find out what was going on in his head. Sometimes it's just not that easy.

 

[marplots]

All snark aside, it's possible that at times Michael Brown was an amazing human being. He could have been caring, loving, and a complete angel....at times. We all can be. The only point is that he certainly wasn't on that specific day. That isn't decided by one specific action, it is decided by a chain of events.

I get a kick out of people saying "why would Brown do x" or "why would Brown do y, I certainly wouldn't have and it's not sensible."

Answer me, how many of Browns other actions are sensible to you? Would you steal from a store if you wanted something? Would you intimidate the owner to get what you want? Would you walk down the middle of the road for no other reason than you wanted too? Despite Mumbles...analysis of the sidewalk condition, they were in perfect shape. You can see it from all the pictures.

Would you refuse to get out of the road when told to by a police officer? Would you, despite davefoc weird insinuation that it's understandable, attack a police officer? I know I certainly wouldn't, and my parents never EVER taught me to do anything remotely close. I also have never even thought of teaching my children the same. To imply something like that is madness to me.

Think of all the things Michael Brown did that day, not as individual events, but as a series of events that led to the conclusion. At the end of that, sit back and ask, "Were any, or even most, of his decisions that he made that day the decisions of a rational or clear thinking man?"

I have openly stated that it is tragic that this man lost his life. I don't know what caused him to reach this level of indecency. It has nothing to do with his skin color, that much I do know. I wish he were alive so we could ask him questions, and find out what was going on in his head. Sometimes it's just not that easy.

That's not a bad way to add some important nuances. But say we all agree on the "wouldn't do's." We ought to then ask if his actions are as much out of line with his peers in that community as they are with our own. If at least some of what you describe is the norm for a young black male in that area, it sheds a different light on things, makes it more about the context than just Michael Brown.

Even painted in a nice shade of thug, I'd still wonder if Brown is the disease or a symptom.

 

[tsig]

Ooh he's big and scary...

Allegedly ran back; not all witnesses agree. Running aggressively in loose pants and no shoes is hard to do.

Esp. when you have been shot. Hot lead has a chilling effect.

 

[tsig]

Remember when he made that macaroni art thing and momma hung it on the fridge and he gave her a big hug and said, "I lurve you, momma." It was so cute, how he mispronounce "love" like that. Later, he shared his gummy bears with his sister, which was nice.

I suppose I'll have to dredge up some video evidence to confirm that at least once in his life, Michael Brown acted with humanity and kindness. I'll have to check my back-up hard drive though.

Oh wait. I don't really need video evidence do I? Just trust my testimony. Pretend I'm a cop.

Then there was the time his dad was trapped under a car and he bulked up (from 220 lbs to 300) then grunted and lifted it off.

I'm not a cop and I don't play one on TV but I did stay at a Holiday Inn.

 

[tsig]

That he was a violent psycho was already established before he even laid eyes on Wilson.

Whose psychosis only manifested in the last hour of his life?

 

[RandFan]

A human being.

Thank you.

 

[Ranb]

Running aggressively in loose pants and no shoes is hard to do.

I had no problem running aggressively with loose pants and no shoes when I was his age. Where are you getting this stuff?

Ranb

 

[Skeptic Tank]

A human being.

Is that meant to be an impressive trait or accomplishment?

7 billion plus and counting. We're just organisms and there's nothing magical or divine about us granting some sort of inherent, universal worth.

Some of those 7 billion make the world a worse place by making the streets less safe, intimidating and victimizing others, etc. Brown was one such.

We have no shortage of human beings and we'll be just fine without Michael Brown in the species anymore. In fact, we're better off.

 

[pharphis]

Quick question in case I missed it... does the physical evidence regarding the gun shots support the "hands in the air" testimonies?

 

[WildCat]

Quick question in case I missed it... does the physical evidence regarding the gun shots support the "hands in the air" testimonies?

No.

 

[PhantomWolf]

He had already been shot. I would have expected to see Michael Brown's all over that area.

Why would you expect to see his blood all over the area? It wasn't spurting from him, it would have been running down his hand and dropping from his fingers. The blood would have landed only near to where he run.

 

[PhantomWolf]

There may have been a thousand or more posts about this early on, between the first and current thread.

Considering that the shots ( the last group ) were rather close together. it is possible the shot to the top of the head ( possibly the last shot fired ) struck as brown was falling forward as a result of having already been hit several times.

There was also presented at least one shot of a football player, whose crown presented a clear target without their face being parallel to the ground.

45 Degrees is not a particularly extreme angle when running, or even walking..

I believe that the Autopsy results indicate that it was a lot more then 45 degrees. The Private autopsy says parallel to the ground, which would put him at near enough to 90 degrees

 

[PhantomWolf]

Strikes me as odd that someone would bend over at a 45 degree angle with their face parallel to the ground and charge someone 10-15 feet away. Not that it didn't happen that way. I've never seen a football player charge with body and head both parallel to the ground for 10 feet. But that's anecdotal, I honestly don't know.

90 degrees and 25-35 feet

 

[pharphis]

I believe that the Autopsy results indicate that it was a lot more then 45 degrees. The Private autopsy says parallel to the ground, which would put him at near enough to 90 degrees

He was an airplane

 

[PhantomWolf]

Do you think Brown was suicidal? Just curious, you need not provide evidence, I'm just wondering why anyone would charge a guy who is clearly ready to kill you. Assuming any sort of logical thought process is involved (agreed, this is an assumption) the only recourse is to 1) run (which clearly did happen) or 2) Give up.
Incidentally, while I admire the level of effort you've put into your analysis on a whole, the whole 'charging like a tackler' thing seems beyond absurd to me. I mean, he might as well have painted a target on his cranium too saying "kill me"

This has been answered a few times, so my answer is likely to be similar.

I suspect, and I can't prove because no one actually knows what was in his head, that after being shot at the car he was at first planning to run and get away. By the time he got to the extend of the run, he realised that injured and likely not as fit as the officer, he wasn't going to lose him. With a combination of adrenalin, endorphins, and the THC in his system, his flight or fight reaction switched back to fight and he decided that he had a chance to tackle Wilson. At that point I don't think he was thinking right, he quite likely believed that surrendering wasn't an option, either because he believed his actions would result in a lengthy jail sentence, or perhaps he believed that since this cop has already shot him once, he'd do it again regardless of what he did. That might bot be so far fetched with several people claiming that Wilson executed Brown on his knees basis purely on "That's what cops do." So this may have been a factor.

So while I don't think we can entirely understand the why, it does seem that he thought that he had a chance of tackling Wilson and taking his gun, likely using it to get away, maybe by pointing it and telling Wilson not to follow, or perhaps to use it to inflict and injury of some kind.

In the end though, we just don't really know.

 

[PhantomWolf]

Here's a page with the audio of the relevant police calls that day, including the ones from Officer Wilson before the initial encounter (asking if the other cars on the robbery needed help since he was in the area) and between the encounters when he calls for back-up before initiating the second encounter. Listen to that second call, does he sound all that irate to you?

As for why he stopped them then and there, recall that both parties (Wilson and Johnson) agree that it was said that Johnson and Brown were almost at their destination. Wilson knows two other cars are in the area and are coming to back him up and he has a chance to effect an arrest before they get into that apartment complex where they might be able to elude him. It's perfectly reasonable in my mind that Wilson would stop them before they reached that complex, where the possibility of something dangerous would be even higher than out in the middle of the street.

Interestingly this page kills dead the claim that Wilson didn't know anything about the robbery and was lying when he claimed that was why he returned and stopped them a second time. Not only did he clearly know about the robbery, he asked if they needed help, and he did, as he claimed in his GJ testimony, call in that he had the two of them. I doubt that will convince any of the lynch mob however.

 

[Aber]

I had no problem running aggressively with loose pants and no shoes when I was his age. Where are you getting this stuff?

Ranb

Without any knowledge of your age, memory, physical build etc this doesn't really add anything. Neither does all the discussion about football tackles without evidence that Michael Brown had any experience of making tackles (there seems to be an unspoken assumption that because he was large and black he must have football experience at school).

The 'charging head down to make a tackle' position is an unstable one which requires a large amount of acceleration from a standing start like a sprinter, and which is only sustainable for a few yards. Michael Brown wasn't built like a sprinter, had probably just run faster and further than he had anytime recently ( without shoes), and didn't have cleats.

I've not seen any evidence on how far apart the two were when Michael Brown turned around, how long after he'd turned around and started moving back before the shooting started and what was said in that time.

Simply turning back does not make him a threat, even charging head down does not make him a significant threat - my memory is that it is easy to avoid a tackler who is more than a couple of yards away.

 

[Cl1mh4224rd]

Simply turning back does not make him a threat, even charging head down does not make him a significant threat - my memory is that it is easy to avoid a tackler who is more than a couple of yards away.

That's a detail that bothers me. If Brown was running forward while looking straight down at the ground, honestly, how difficult would it have been to just... move out of his way? You could play matador all day with a person who doesn't know if you're actually still in front of them as they're blindly running forward.

 

[Cylinder]

Quick question in case I missed it... does the physical evidence regarding the gun shots support the "hands in the air" testimonies?

That's a complex question. It doesn't take much tinkering with one's arms to realize they can be moved in a wide range or orientations with respect to some fixed point.

So, if you extend your arms forward, palms down, like in the classic keyboarding pose you are looking at the dorsal side of each arm. It's kind of the hairy side of some people's arm or the outside of the shoulder.

Rotate it 180°, palms up, kind of the classic pay up sucka pose and you're looking at the ventral side. That's would be the kind of palm side of the arm or the armpit side.

Upper arm means between the shoulder and elbow; lower arm means elbow to wrist.

All the wounds reference the right arm in this instance.

All the wounds referenced below showed no signs of imprint, sooting or stippling -- meaning they were from an indeterminate range (>3 feet.)

Wound 6: This is an entrance wound to the upper arm's ventral surface about 8 inches below the shoulder. The wound path is slightly up, left and back with the associated exit wound (see Wound 7) on the dorsal side ~7.5 inches below the shoulder.

You can say that wound could be consistent with a "hand's up, don't shoot" pose. It would also be consistent with bending your arm and raising it in front of your face or raising your arm in a running motion, or bending at the waist with your arms roughly parallel to the ground.

It would also be consistent with raising a smart phone to video the police...or eating a sandwich.

Wound 8: This is an entrance wound to the lower arm's dorsal surface about 6 inches below the elbow. The wound path is upward, backward and leftward with the associated exit wound (Wound 9) on the ventral surface around 6 inches from the elbow. This wound is also associated with a broken ulna.

Obviously this wound be inconsistent with "hands up, don't shoot", but who the hell expects Brown to retain that pose while taking fire...or charging at Wilson...

Wound 10: This is a shallow graze wound to the bicep ~2 inches above the elbow and generally oriented from 9 o'clock to 3 o'clock. The directionality can't be established so it could be arm down (9->3) or arm up (3->9) -- it could be from back-to-front with the arms up (9->3).

There's a popular social media image that manipulates the standard autopsy diagram to the hands up posture to illustrate how the wound line up but they will do the same from most any position within the normal range of motion.

Having had some little experience with tactical shooting drills, looking at the autopsy diagram as a paper target and having the benefit of the audio sequence, I really get the sense of motion described in Wilson's narrative -- a wide range in elevations with little traverse. Clearly, whatever else is happening, Wilson has a good sight picture dialed in.

Early on when the autopsy diagram was released, I speculated that if the graze wound (Wound 10) was associated with the chest wound (Wound 4) we could conclude that his arms were down but that conclusion can't be made.

What can be concluded is that the head and chest entrance wounds -- specifically wounds 1,2,4 & 5 -- have a downward trajectory that is very hard to describe within the hands up, don't shoot narrative.