Yeah, and now that we've heard from your little soapbox, let's look at what MIGHT have caused that grand jury of 12 citizens to toss the case. And kindly remember, it wasn't that prosecutor who made the decision - it was the JURY. And the JURY decided there wasn't even enough evidence of a crime to send the matter to trial (which is a REALLY REALLY low threshold of proof to attain, by the way). Did they come to that conclusion based on what "everybody on the internet says"? No, they reached that decision after hearing all the witnesses and seeing the video. And what did THEY determine? (This is going from memory of my reading of the DA's summary - I'm not going to bother going back and digging up all the details again.)
First, there were two possible versions of events given:
1. The cop's story:
He was driving to another emergency call, when he was blocked by Brown and friend strolling up the middle of the street. He told Brown to quit walking in the middle of the street and use the sidewalk instead, which resulted in Brown becoming angry and abusive. After the first exchange with Brown, the cop noticed the cigarillos in Brown's hand and recalled the radio call in from minutes earlier about the store robbery (which was, IN FACT, Brown), so he called him back to question him about that.
This resulted in Brown - who was 6"4 and 292lbs (and had proven violent tendencies - see store clerk beating above) - leaning into the cop car window and trying to punch out the cop, who was held in place by his seatbelt.
The cop drew his pistol, and Brown tried to take it away from him, at which point the cop fired once and hit Brown in the hand he was trying to grab the pistol with.
Brown then ran away.
In the circumstances, the cop got out of his car to pursue him. (Sorry, but if you rob a store, then assault a cop in his car and try to wrestle his pistol away from him before running away, the cop IS going to pursue you to arrest you for robbery and everything else...)
Instead of surrendering, Brown turned around, lowered his head, and charged the cop with the apparent intention of taking him out.
So the cop took Brown out instead, with several shots from his pistol.
2. The "victim" story:
Poor little unarmed teenager Brown was peacefully walking down the street on his way to see his Granny, when the mean racist white cop picked on him. And then shot him in the back while he was either standing holding his hands up or else on the ground.
To determine which of these two diametrically opposed versions of event should be believed -- or more accurately, to determine if there was ANY evidence to support Victim Version and therefore justify sending the cop to trial, the Grand Jury looked at the testimony of all available witnesses and the physical and forensic evidence.
The Witness's Testimony and the Forensic Evidence:
A. "Victim Story" (Version #2 above) was supported by ONE eyewitness. That was the good buddy that Brown had been walking with. The problem with his testimony, of course, is that he was not only Brown's buddy, he frankly was more like Brown's accomplice. Not a great and credible witness, to be honest. After all, what is he going to say? "Yeah, we knocked over that store and then ..."
Still, it's not up to the Grand Jury to weigh the credibility of the various witness' testimony - just to determine if there is sufficient evidence that - if a jury DID believe it - it COULD lead to a conviction. So the fact that the witness giving this story is a fellow thug is really neither here nor there as far as the evidence's admissibility.
Except that in this particular case, the following also turned out to be true:
B. ALL those other so-called "witnesses" who "saw Brown with his hands in the air" actually didn't see a thing ... because NONE of them were genuine eyewitnesses. When it came time to give testimony under oath, it turned out that NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THEM had actually seen the incident. They were just blabbing what "someone else" had told them...
C. The ACTUAL eye-witnesses -- apart, of course, from Brown's best buddy: EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM (and several of them, BTW, were BLACK themselves) gave stories that substantially supported the cop's version of events.
(i) They saw Brown leaning into the window of the cop car and some sort of altercation going on when the first shot was fired;
(ii) They saw Brown flee and the cop chase him on foot;
(iii) They saw 6'4" 292lb Brown turn and charge towards the cop, at which point the remaining shots were fired;
(iv) Brown NEVER "stood still and put his hands up" or gave any other sign that he was "peacefully surrendering". In fact, his hands were never above his head - they were always in punching or grappling position, and he was in motion TOWARDS the cop in a threatening and aggressive manner right up until the point he hit the ground;
(v) No shots were fired "into his back" after he was on the ground.
And, as I noted, that evidence came from local witnesses who were BLACK themselves. So the "It's all racism, Man" allegation really doesn't hold water.
And that, in turn, leads to the physical and forensic evidence:
The Forensic Evidence is entirely consistent with the cop's version of events and totally inconsistent with the "shot while peacefully surrendering" version.
(i) Brown had a gunshot wound in one hand and gunshot residue on that hand and powder / lead fragments peppering his hand and sleeve. This is consistent with someone who is trying to grab a gun at the time they are shot in the hand with it. It is entirely INCONSISTENT with someone who has their hand in the air above their head.
(ii) The remaining bullets hit from the front - again inconsistent with "shot while running away" OR "shot in the back while lying on the ground". Angles of entry and so forth are again consistent with hits on a charging target.
Again, the American Grand Jury is very similar to the Canadian Preliminary Inquiry, except that in the US, the verdict at the Grand Jury is determined by a jury of citizens while in Canada, the Preliminary Inquiry is held before a Provincial Court Judge (sitting alone) to determine if the Crown has sufficient evidence to send a case for trial to Queen's Bench Judge and Jury.
In Canada, the official test for the preliminary inquiry is: "Does the Crown have sufficient evidence that, IF BELIEVED, MIGHT lead a reasonable jury, properly instructed, to convict?" A cruder but still substantially accurate way to put that is "Does the Crown have any evidence at all to suggest this guy committed this crime?" As I said earlier, that is a very very very LOW threshold that the Crown has to be able to step over to take a matter to trial - which is the reason that approximately 99% of all matters that go to preliminary inquiry do in fact get sent on to trial. (The prelim is primarily seen as a tool for the defence lawyers to get discovery of the Crown case and an early chance to test the Crown's witnesses in cross-examination. It is very rare for the defence even to bother making an application to have matters dismissed at the end of the prelim.)
Not surprisingly, since both systems arise from the same British Common Law tradition, the American test for the Grand Jury is virtually identical to the Canadian one for the prelminary inquiry. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that the Canadian prelim test is identical to the American grand jury test, because the Canadian test mentioned earlier was plagiarized word-for-word from the old American case of the US v Shepherd.
Bottomline: The ONLY way this case got tossed by the Grand Jury (especially knowing, as they did, that such a verdict might very likely lead to further violence and looting in their own community - and possibly endanger their own homes, businesses and lives) is because there was NOTHING to support a criminal charge.
But hey, if you want to decide instead that the jury spent hundreds of hours hearing and viewing evidence before coming to this conclusion but did so just because "the prosecutor's father was a slain cop, his mother worked at the police station for 20 plus years, his brother, uncle and cousin all worked with the St Louis PD", well ... you're right. There is absolutely NO point trying to convince you of anything different by referring to anything so irrelevant to your beliefs as the actual FACTS of the case...
