Posted on 08/15/2014 12:36:56 PM PDT by IChing
I love it when we’re both right ha!
Your reasoning is similar to mine on this: Officer Wilson clears his call, heads off to assist at the QuikTrip to talk to the shopkeeper. Maybe keeping an eye out for somebody running away from the QT. Coming down the street, he sees two youts on a Sunday stroll and warns them out of the middle of the street. Doesn’t dawn on him until after he drives past, sees the ceegars, and puts two and two together. Throw it in reverse and off the story continues....I guess Wilson’s reaction time in seconds to seeing Brown would depend on how fast Wilson’s vehicle was going when he passed the youts - and reaction time of the ‘ole brain clicking together hat,shoes,height,weight- and - ceegars. Was he going 25mph or 45mph? Maybe he verified the description before he reversed it. Maybe he called assistance. But he may not have - knowing that he was a second responder he would have expected another unit to be around - but it arrived 3 minutes later.
Thanks for the links, Covenantor :) Now we wait for the forensics to fill in the 3 minutes ...
Based on what we knew yesterday, and logically assessing only what we knew yesterday as the truth spoken by witnesses, your assessment that the officer’s shooting of the suspect was either premature or wrong is probably correct.
But as the evidence comes out from the investigation, the witness statements seem to be less credible, especially the statement from the friend of the suspect who actually assisted in the thuggish robbery prior to the confrontation, and those of other supporting witnesses who know or know of the suspect. This makes whatever the officer says to be more credible and he has not said anything yet.
So, I think we need to wait for the rest of it, but it could be a “righteous shooting” as some call it. If a officer is assaulted, we are talking about seconds here to react and the truth of what happened does not seem to be clear to me yet. Pictures seem to say he was not shot in the back, to add to the questions.
So I think judgment needs to be withheld until the questions are answered.
Logically speaking, of course..
On a more personal and emotional note, I think he did the citizens of the city a favor by taking him down. The suspect was becoming a rolling crime spree.
Stuff happens..
That is so 1960s. Today's thug goons steal $1500 custom wheels and low profile tires.
A shotgun would save many lives!
I can get kinda wordy so I broke this out into another post, but another thing I wanted to mention was, just like Brown and his friend may not have expected such a quick response from PD, (they didn’t anticipate the shopkeeper to call the police in the first place) they also didn’t anticipate that the first police vehicle they saw would be the only responder. Otherwise, they probably wouldn’t have blocked the door/shoved it back on the officer in the first place.
I will give the buddy, Darian, 2 points tho. He may be lying to protect his streeet cred, but in the store video he took the cigars Mike Brown handed off to him, but then put them up on the side counter - he didn’t steal them. CNN has a great video isolation on this.
(shopkeeper probably didn’t figure out Brown only had the one box until later, if it all, in the confusion - if the cops had made it to the store first, they might have picked up on the out-of-place box sitting there)
“Maybe the cops didn’t want to rush to judgement.”
Bingo. Only one foolish department would rush to the mic to publish “facts” without first knowing all the facts. ESPECIALLY, in that area of town, and knowing it would be a volatile situation.
Darian might be the smart one of the two, just going along with big thug as little as possible when it looked to become a serious assault. One punch from that moose would have caused serious damage to the owner/clerk.
no joke and it was a gal behind the counter, too. The guy that got manhandled was another employee
“you don’t chase and shoot multiple times for 35 feet.
It was reported he fired seven times.”
You do if the threat is still coming towards you. We don’t know that isn’t what happened. Witnesses in these types of situations often lie about LEO. It’s a race thing coupled with a hatred towards cops.
If this guy was high on some kind of drug no taser is going to stop him and indeed, it may take multiple bullets to stop him. My understanding is that officers are trained to shoot to kill and to keep shooting until the threat is stopped.
You have to get reasonably close to someone to taze them. That may not be the best plan in all cases. Especially when a suspect is combative, has already reached for your weapon and you have literally a split second to make a decision.
Wait until all information is gathered. All we really have right now is a lot of yakity yak from the news media and unreliable eye witnesses, one of whom was in on the robbery and may be afraid to tell the truth.
“Josie,” a friend of Ferguson Officer Darren Wilson, called into The Dana Loesch Radio Show today. Josie gave Officer Wilson’s side of the story.
Here’s the transcript:
“He pulled up ahead of them. And then he got a call-in that there was a strong-arm robbery. And, they gave a description. And, he’s looking at them and they got something in their hands and it looks like it could be what, you know those cigars or whatever. So he goes in reverse back to them. Tries to get out of his car. They slam his door shut violently. I think he said Michael did. And, then he opened the car again. He tried to get out. He stands up.
And then Michael just bum-rushes him and shoves him back into his car. Punches him in the face and them Darren grabs for his gun. Michael grabbed for the gun. At one point he got the gun entirely turned against his hip. And he shoves it away. And the gun goes off.
Well, then Michael takes off and gets to be about 35 feet away. And, Darren’s first protocol is to pursue. So, he stands up and yells, “Freeze!” Michael and his friend turn around. And Michael taunts him… And then all the sudden he just started bumrushing him. He just started coming at him full speed. And, so he just started shooting. And, he just kept coming. And, so he really thinks he was on something.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3193375/posts
This corroborates officer Wilson’s account as relayed by Josie, background audio at 6:28 and 8:31 captures an eyewitness, not knowing he was being recorded, describing the same thing Josie described:
If it’s true Michael Brown rushed the cop from 25 or 30 feet as if to tackle him, I have no doubts the toxicology report will show PCP or some other wacko crazy ghetto drug combo.
....I was a prosecutor for 25 years. I don’t care WHAT the kid did before the cop confronted him. His hands were in the air. He was shot. He was murdered. My Office, based on the facts I see here, would have prosecuted the cop. I don’t care if it was Charles Manson who had his hands up. The cop committed a crime....
how is your complaint looking? got the cop convicted yet?
you were a prosecutor for 25 years, did you not learn to evaluate evidence especially eyewitness statements? consider the source do they have an axe to grind or agenda? would you not interview them after you had other facts in order to judge their credibility before putting someone on trial?
should we be worried that some of the people you prosecuted were rushed to judgement and didn’t get a fair shake? maybe take a look at some of your convictions? as a lowly PI who has seen both cops and robbers lie, I would never come to a conclusion based only on any person’s statements.
point: hands almost up not shot in the back..she would be undermined on cross if she was ever put on the witness stand..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FTSPGly6NM
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.