(Anthony Shahid with his hand on Dorian Johnson's shoulder)
Posted on 12/15/2014 8:06:55 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Since the night St. Louis Country prosecutor Bob McCullough announced that police officer Darren Wilson would face no charges in the death of unarmed black teen Michael Brown and released thousands of documents in connection to the case, many interested parties have combed through the pages and analyzed them, trying to get a sense of why the grand jury decided not to indict.
CNN recently did a comprehensive breakdown of Ferguson witness reports which showed how witnesses on both sides presented conflicting information, changed their stories, and some lied under oath.
Some witnesses testimony, like that of Dorian Johnson, the young man who was with Brown the day he lost his life, was not initially released by prosecutors the night that Ferguson burned. And the question many are asking is why. Why did the prosecutor do what he did and how he did it? Was it to derail the case against Officer Wilson?
Given the untraditional nature of the grand jury and grand jury proceedings, many analysts from CNN questioned the motivation of prosecutor McCullough in both including witnesses that were not credible, and dumping all of the information at once.
Sunny Hostin, a former federal prosecutor, believes the state wanted to avoid presenting a clear-cut case that would have led to an indictment. “Prosecutors generally present very streamlined cases to the grand jury,” she says. “As a prosecutor you should not present witnesses in front of the grand jury that you wouldn’t present at trial.”
Says CNN,
Analysts differ over why prosecutors called witnesses with questionable credibility. Some say the prosecution wanted to present a jumbled case, to help Wilson. Others say the intense scrutiny and likelihood of a separate federal probe make it common in some places to toss anything and everything at a grand jury probing a controversial police killing — even witnesses who prosecutors believe aren’t likely to tell the truth.
Some witnesses told fantastical stories with no basis in reality, and some admitted to straight lying. Some, you’d have to read their testimony to believe it.
One particular witness, Witness 40, who supported Wilson’s version of events, was most likely not even in Ferguson on the day of Brown’s murder. She also posted a racist rant on Facebook the day of Brown’s death, saying, “They need to kill the f—ing n—–s. It is like an ape fest.” Witness 40 also organized a small group helping raise money for officers, including Wilson.
Witness 40 admitted to being bipolar, taking medicine for migraines, and having memory problems.
“Is it possible, do you think, that you dreamed about this after it happened and it feels real to you that you were up there?” a prosecutor asked. The witness insisted she knew it was real.
On the other side of the fence, there was another witness, 37, whose story did not seem credible either, but he pointedly asked prosecutors an interesting question.
From the testimony:
“If none of my stuff is making any sense, like why do y’all keep contacting me?” the witness asked.
And yet, all of this information, as well as dozens of others was included in grand jury testimony that ultimately resulted in Wilson’s non-indictment.
“The prosecutors didn’t want to indict,” Hostin says. “That’s why they conducted it that way.”
The first think I learned is how poor the reporting was leading up to the decision.
The second thing I learned is how poor it continues to be.
Key witness Dorian Johnson (the gentle giant's partner in crime) seemed to be making it up as he went along. Others were looking for that 15 minutes of fame and apparently witnessed nothing, or very little first hand.
When you hear testimony from the cops and FBI who handled the case it brings up two thoughts:
1) TV shows like CSI are nothing like reality and...
2) Why don't investigators learn from those shows?
It was only a matter of time before “Big Mike” was going to die, he chose a direct path to his demise.
I’ve been on several juries (not grand) and it’s always irritated me when they block information from us. Juries should hear EVERYTHING & sort it out. Let the prosecution & defense explain all they want, but nothing should be withheld.
The prosecutor is a Democrat.
It must really be a vast conspiracy against AAs, what with micro-aggressions, white privilege and “Hands up. Don’t shoot.”
It is not helping AAs to promote fantasies and excuses for failure.
Question 1 for Sunny: Given the totality of the evidence, could an honest jury find Wilson guilty beyond a reasonable doubt?
Answer has to be “No”, though she would dodge and weave.
Question 2 for Sunny: When you were a prosecutor, did you pursue indictments of individuals when you knew there was no way an honest jury should convict based on the evidence?
Unbelievable. The prosecution presents the witnesses who allege Officer Wilson acted illegally. Those witnesses’ testimony was discredited, but can you imagine the uproar if those witnesses’ testimony were not presented? So now the “Hands Up” crowd is furious that the use of discredited witnesses made their side look bad. One witness even asked, “If none of my stuff is making any sense, like why do y’all keep contacting me?” the witness asked.
To be sure, some of the witnesses supporting Wilson also were discredited... by the prosecution. “Witness 40” posted an apparently very racist rant, and the prosecution not only presented that as evidence against the witness, but also suggested that her medicine for manic depression and migraines made her dream up the events. (Bipolar disorder may certainly make someone make wildly ill-considered comments, but it does not make the person delusional, nor does the medicine for bipolar disorder.)
Can't bring themselves to say "accomplice?"
I guess it never occurred to Sunny that prosecutors generally present cases that they believe will win at trial too. Officer Darren Wilson was clearly going to be found not guilty at trial, and McCullough would have preferred not even to present to a Grand Jury, but due to Sunny and all of the community organizers like her, the prosecutor was not allowed to decide whether to present to a Grand Jury or not. He had to. So he did it in a fair and balanced way.
Re: Witness 40. We are supposed to assume that because her version agreed with the Prosecutors and she was of doubtful verity that the Prosecution case also was BS. However, it is not established that the Grand Jury gave any weight to her testimony but gave weight to the evidence that her testimony happened to agree with. That her “lies” happened to agree with the factual evidence does not sully those facts. Oh and notice the article does not affirm she was not there as the words “most likely” does not mean “we know for a fact.”.
if the “bad” witnesses had been withheld form the grand jury, the same critics would be claiming THAT was the prosecutor trying to steer the jury
how about the idea that they let the grand jury hear as much as possible and make up their own mind
The critics seem to have the insane Liberal idea of what “justice” means. To a Liberal, in these cases, “justice” does not mean obtaining any real objective justice, it just means “get a prosecution”. That the officials took the grand jury route showed they were MOST in favor of justice, and not just prosecuting someone for the sake of prosecuting someone.
Let’s not forget that the msm and the NAAACP and other race hustlers used these so called “witnesses” to promote their agenda. “Hands up don’t shoot”.
I don’t get why the ‘Hands up’ meme is so popular with the thug culture across the nation.
If they put their hands up, their pants fall down.
(Anthony Shahid with his hand on Dorian Johnson's shoulder)
Why aren’t they arrested?!!
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