Michael Brown's family should apologize to Darren Wilson, not sue him

[jackfaire]

Constricted space, the person outside the vehicle would have a distinct advantage there, wouldn't they?

I don't know. Grand Jury means that in someway he violated police procedure. How I don't know but that's why they do Grand Juries. My only argument is that yes they have ever legal right to expect Darren to have to explain and justify in a court of law why that shouldn't mean punitive action.

A Grand Jury is an incredibly biased place that doesn't guarantee a fair reading of the facts. A civil trial is a fair and unbiased space where Darren will justify himself to a jury with lawyers. Then it will be up to the Jury to decide if he had just cause to violate police procedure or not.

I am neither arguing that Darren did or did not have just cause. I am arguing that the trial is absolutely necessary to establish that since a Grand Jury can't.

[mjr]

I don't know.

Pretty easy to figure out re: disadvantage of being in the car.

Sit in a car's driver's seat, have a friend reach in and grab you. See how "mobile" you are. See how constricted your movements are. See what you're able to grab/reach for. See how it feels. See if it feels like "Hulk Hogan" hugging a kid.

[jackfaire]

Pretty easy to figure out re: disadvantage of being in the car.

Sit in a car's driver's seat, have a friend reach in and grab you. See how "mobile" you are. See how constricted your movements are. See what you're able to grab/reach for. See how it feels. See if it feels like "Hulk Hogan" hugging a kid.

This means absolutely nothing. Seriously. What is your point here? This has nothing to do with whether or not there should be a trial. IF he tickled the suspect with a goddamn feather there should be a trial.

He violated police procedure this isn't conjecture this is fact. The fact that I private citizen #000056 don't know exactly what happened. doesn't have any bearing on the law needing to be observed.

There has been no argument put forth in this thread that argues that it's okay for us to ignore the law this time.

The Law is the Law. The only possible argument you could be making at this point for why we shouldn't follow the law in this case is the thing I keep being told it has nothing to do with.

Race.

See cuz Darren Wilson was white and Michael Brown was Black. The law says that when a cop(s) violate police procedure they sit before a Grand Jury. The law currently has that Grand Jury so biased that if it was me or you the entire thing would be called a miscarriage of justice.

The family of the victim as a last resort is the end allowed to take a civil case against the officer(s) in question and it's considered a valid non-nuisance lawsuit because no Grand Jury has ever indicted a cop even when they were more guilty than OJ. Like I mean evidence says they were guilty as freaking sin guilty no question no "could be covering for someone else" 100% violated police procedure so brutally that a man died.

If you want to argue that Darren Wilson had just cause to violate police procedure then start a thread "Darren Wilson was justified in violating police procedure and here are the facts of the case"

This thread is about arguing that like James Chasse (he was white) Michael Brown's family deserves their day in court.

The Grand Jury didn't convene to determine if Darren had cause to violate police procedure. That's what a trial is for. All they convened for was to determine "do we want to go to trial" Guess what like every Grand Jury before it they decided no.

So you can start your new thread putting all of the facts of the case and arguing them that's fine. But if you continue arguing that people should no longer be allowed their legal rights then maybe we should explore why?

Being black is the only reason I can see anyone would want to deny the Brown family their day in court.

[mjr]

This means absolutely nothing. Seriously. What is your point here? This has nothing to do with whether or not there should be a trial. IF he tickled the suspect with a goddamn feather there should be a trial.

My comments are in reference to your comments here:

http://fratching.com/showpost.php?p=166682&postcount=25

[jackfaire]

My comments are in reference to your comments here:

http://fratching.com/showpost.php?p=166682&postcount=25

Ah well except that he wasn't in the car. He was in the car when they first struggled but according to what the Grand Jury considered the most reliable testimony he gave chase. This means one of two things. He was still in the car which means he had a heavy weapon/shield the car.

Or he left the car and pursued Michael on foot. Either way at that point Darren had the upper hand when Darren decided to shoot him.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/us...says.html?_r=0

But that speaks to a different topic than whether the law should be observed or not.

My comment was mostly shock that a fully trained police officer could be that fearful when he had every advantage. It's almost like having every advantage somehow made him more scared not less.

I will say this if in that first struggle Darren had shot and killed Michael I would personally consider it justified because yes I do understand how effectively being pinned down could cause a normal non-trained person to shit their pants and reach for their gun instead of their Tazer. I would also while understanding this then ask that Darren be stripped of his badge gun and given his walking papers because he's not an untrained person. According to the same article backup arrived 90 seconds later which means that Darren called in for backup. He knew it was coming and he also by the time he shot Michael Brown well aware that Michael Brown was completely 100% Unarmed.

The reaction he had was Panic. Pure unadulterated "shit my pants" panic. In a situation where panic wasn't a reasonable response. As an untrained child I was in fights with boys much bigger than me in situations where they have been trying to kill me. One of them picked up one of those floor scooters from gym class and started beating me with it so bad i almost lost consciousness. Even then I didn't panic as much as Darren did.

So forgive me for thinking that either something in Darren's own mind made him panic or he's simply unfit to be an officer.

The police are trained over and over and over again to be prepared to handle every situation they can prepare for. While violent it was still a situation he had prepared for, trained for. Being rushed by an unarmed suspect has always been at the core of being a police officer. That very situation is why non-lethal methods to incapacitate were introduced.

There was only one moment when shooting him would have been justified and they passed that moment. Darren was chasing the suspect who decided for some reason to turn face the person chasing him and run back at him.

And as I type it I have to point at the logical inconsistency there.

See they ignored any testimony that "kept changing" do you know what happens when you recall a memory it alters the memory because the way the mind works is your recalling a memory of a memory so you're effectively making a copy of a copy. This means they ignored or didn't submit or didn't even take eyewitness testimony at the scene and instead during a months long Grand Jury went by what people said long after the situation was done.

So here's the logical inconsistency I see. Why did Darren Shoot Michael?

The suspect was unarmed and police officer was in pursuit. Suspect stops and turns giving the officer time to reach suspect and tackle him to the ground at which time he is cuffed and put in the back of the squad car.

That makes sense. You know what doesn't make sense stopping short of a suspect that's you already know is unarmed because he went for your gun instead of pulling one to shoot you when you were pinned in your vehicle. Giving the suspect room to charge at you. Enough that a charge would have enough power behind it that it would scare you into shooting.

See nothing about that moment makes any sense at all. And people will say "monday morning quarter backing or" yeah so it's a cop's job to in a second know if a suspect is armed or not. So he knew. And he shot anyway. He set up a situation where he could shoot Michael and make it look like self defense when it wasn't even close to it.

Anyone with a brother can attest when you chase your brother you don't let him stop turn and get a free swing on you. You tackle his ass to the ground. Even with a continued struggle Darren when he called in for backup would have been told how far out it was. He knew they were coming he knew he was perfectly safe. But he shot the suspect.

But sure self defense let's go with that. After all Michael Brown was Black so he must have had superpowers that rendered standard police procedure ineffective.

[Gravekeeper]

The reaction he had was Panic. Pure unadulterated "shit my pants" panic.

But not scared enough to wait for back up mind you. Only scared enough to immediately get out and give chase to the unstoppable black monster that supposedly almost killed him. It was only 61 seconds between Wilson radio'n in that he was going to ask two teens to move onto the sidewalk and Brown being shot to death.

Oh, right, and back up that he says he called for but no one heard because his radio must have been jostled during the struggle so it had "changed to a different channel".

-.-

[AmbrosiaWriter]

Ok, I've been staying mostly out of this, but I need to chime in on the "If he was so scared <insert whatever."

Panic is not logical. Panic actually automatically turns our logic immediately off because logic slows us down when decisions have to be made.

I'm not going to go into what I believed happened because that's pretty much irrelevant, but I hate it when people bring up the argument of "If he was so scared" - which is very similar to "If she was so abused". It's a neuro-atypical mindset, you cannot apply you cool, calm logic while you sit safe in your chair to it.

Maybe he wasn't panicked, maybe he was. Maybe he knew exactly what he was doing and chose that action deliberately out of vindictive maliciousness... or maybe he didn't. You weren't in his head, and you can try to psycho-analyze the physical actions we know he took, however, no one can claim to know 100% what triggers in his brain caused him to make the actions he did.

[jackfaire]

Ok, I've been staying mostly out of this, but I need to chime in on the "If he was so scared <insert whatever."

Panic is not logical. Panic actually automatically turns our logic immediately off because logic slows us down when decisions have to be made.

I agree but why he did what he did didn't seem to be the OPs point. At least I didn't think it was ultimately I can second guess but the important thing to this thread is that the trial is not only justified it's necessary.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

t's a neuro-atypical mindset, you cannot apply you cool, calm logic while you sit safe in your chair to it.

This is fair (and I'm also staying out of the details of this). I know there are some people that train for these situations and may actually be able to handle them in less wheels off fashion, but you're right - once someone has gone into a full panic mode armchair quarterbacking is pointlesss - that person has gone into a state where instinct and survival are the only things their bodies are telling them to do.

I myself am prone to irrational panic attacks (probably genetic) and have had to do a lot of training to fix the situation when it happens. I have no doubt when someone is in a justifiably paniced state, "what you should have done" is about as helpful as "well the situation would have been different if the A Team showed up." It's fantasy land.

For the topic which I've mostly stayed out of - no problem with the lawsuit. The family has a right to apply tort law if they feel they've been damaged by the officer. That said, the details are for the jury. The public as already made up their minds.

The only thing I don't like (and this is a general thing) is in tort cases after criminal cases I think they doubly favor the plaintiff. Advantage 1 is they have full use of their funds to hire the best representation possible while the respondent generally has whatever is left from their criminal defense (they're probably cash poor) to get whomever will work for that low a wage. Advantage 2 they enter that compromised environment with a lower burden of proof. I'd sort of like to see the situation amended where US Courts capped legal fees in Civil courts when the case is tied to a prior criminal prosecution. That's not for Darren Wilson mind you, I just think the existing pattern makes it too easy theoretically for the plaintiffs.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Being black is the only reason I can see anyone would want to deny the Brown family their day in court.

Minor nitpick on this - don't discount the ... shall we say, sporting event nature of how people line up on issues these days. To me, what you said is a 1st class ad-hominem in that it sounds plausible (and I have no doubt it is a factor for some/many), but no its not the only reason.

Republicans have historically favored police and their unions. It has been like this since around 1968. If you're in a union anywhere else, you can go fuck yourself (card carrying former-member that used to read NY Post anti-union and giggle). However, 1968's political realignment was also about race... so.... That said, I think flat out its an identity issue- they support police and fire fighters as a part of their character and will believe their version of events by default.

And I don't fault them, because in watching these stories I have seen some liberals and PoC watching that have predictably the exact opposite reaction. It's about identity. Its sort of why when this stuff broke I started favoring mandatory cameras. I think we've reached a point technologically we don't have to take anyone's word for it. And the people that want to make it about race will every time regardless of what's on the tapes. I do believe these events happen to PoC but some rhetoric from that side is flat out the same that I would side eye when it was coming from white people holed up in their militia bunker. And at the same time, I'm pretty sure there's the other group that could watch a tape of an Officer nuke a kindergarten classroom and still mindfuck their way into how it was justifiable self-defense.

[jackfaire]

Minor nitpick on this - don't discount the ... shall we say, sporting event nature of how people line up on issues these days. To me, what you said is a 1st class ad-hominem in that it sounds plausible (and I have no doubt it is a factor for some/many), but no its not the only reason.

I fully agree people do have a tendency to turn these things into circuses which is appalling. But that is not why I said what I said.

James Chasse Family didn't sue the cops that beat their son to death because of race they did so because they wanted justice and the Grand Jury system failed them.

In the years since that case irrespective of Black Lives Matter people have come to question the validity of biased Grand Juries and many people have turned to Lawsuit since at least there Guilty/Not Guilty are what's important.

In a Grand Jury the only thing that has to be established is "can we get a conviction"

That question is answered by a biased panel disinclined to risk convicting one of their own. So while I agree that both sides turn it into a circus that isn't at all while Michael Brown's family is suing. They just want the truth and justice.

So yeah anyone trying to deny them that for either camp has a nefarious reason for doing so. So I will amend my original statement people who try to deny the Browns their day in court are racist....or they want cops to be above the very law they are sworn to enforce.

Both camps should be barred from the courtroom, both black lives matter and people on Darren Wilson's side. It should be a closed court room consisting of the judge, jury, and both sides of the case.

Michael Brown was still a human being first and foremost and a loved member of his family regardless of his own actions both Darren Wilson and the Brown Family should be treated with respect and allowed a day in court without the peanut gallery.