patrick.net

It was a sham to have the feds decide it needs to be taken to the grand jury to quell the riots, taking that decision out of the county prosecutor's hands. Left alone, the prosecutor would have never taken it to the GJ, thus making your sham (point) moot.

Since the feds forced it, Holder should have been the one front and center in front of the GJ presenting the evidence...but of course, realizing the obvious outcome given the dearth of evidence, he did not want his batting average affected either.

tatupu70 says

I don't ignore it--it's a reasonable argument. But, once you decide to go to a grand jury, it shouldn't be a sham. That's my point.

ps. my post above is "Damning Evidence"...

“Having read the transcripts of the grand jury, and having been a prosecutor for thirteen years, I don’t see how this case normally would even have been brought to the grand jury,” Giuliani said.
“This is the kind of case, had it not had the racial overtones and the national publicity, in which the prosecutor would have come to the conclusion that there was not enough evidence to bring to the grand jury.”

http://nypost.com/2014/11/30/giuliani-to-holder-dont-make-federal-case-out-of-ferguson/

SoftShell says

ps. my post above is "Damning Evidence"...

No, it's your opinion. And you're entitled to it.

Do you disagree that indictments have been returned on less?

But according to YOU, 'evidence' is just 'opinion'...so my "damning evidence" comment is correct.

Tatupu said: Again--I think folks here have difficulty understating what a fact is. Officer Wilson's testimony is backed by some other witnesses and some of the forensic evidence. But his version is contradicted by several witnesses and some of the forensic evidence is not supportive of his version.

In any event, none of it qualifies as a fact.

http://patrick.net/?p=1248144&c=1156052#comment-1156052

tatupu70 says

SoftShell says

ps. my post above is "Damning Evidence"...

No, it's your opinion. And you're entitled to it.

No disagreement.

tatupu70 says

Do you disagree that indictments have been returned on less?

SoftShell says

But according to YOU, 'evidence' is just 'opinion'...so my "damning evidence" comment is correct.

Nope--that's not what I said. Some evidence is fact. Some is opinion. A witness observation is not a fact. An analysis of forensic evidence saying it's unlikely x happened is opinion.

Forensic evidence stating the victim was shot 5 times would be fact.

The libbies sent in their b team? What is that even supposed to mean?

I'm politically agnostic and could fart something more interesting then the group of squid arguing for an expansion of the govt and larger police state. You'd have to be an idiot of epic proportions to root on the police

Did you even read dodgertardjohn? The guy is likely retarded with his nonsense

If you are unable to grade the various levels of ignorance from the left, I can't help you.

errc says

The libbies sent in their b team? What is that even supposed to mean?

Nope.
The forensic evidence may show 5 bullet holes, but cannot account for richochets...he could have been shot 4 times, with one richochet causing two of the holes.
Everything is opinion.

tatupu70 says

Nope--that's not what I said. Some evidence is fact. Some is opinion. A witness observation is not a fact. An analysis of forensic evidence saying it's unlikely x happened is opinion.

Forensic evidence stating the victim was shot 5 times would be fact.

SoftShell says

Nope.

The forensic evidence may show 5 bullet holes, but cannot account for richochets...he could have been shot 4 times, with one richochet causing two of the holes.

Everything is opinion

I know you're being ridiculous, but if there were 5 bullets recovered from 5 bullet holes in a body, I would consider a statement that he was shot 5 times as a fact. But I understand your point. Are you happier with--it's a fact that Michael Brown is deceased?

errc says

The libbies sent in their b team? What is that even supposed to mean?

I'm politically agnostic and could fart something more interesting then the group of squid arguing for an expansion of the govt and larger police state. You'd have to be an idiot of epic proportions to root on the police

Did you even read dodgertardjohn? The guy is likely retarded with his nonsense

What SoftShell meant is that there are left leaning posters here at Pat.net that have the professional knowledge to address this thread, but are choosing not to. SoftShell is hypothesizing, probably correctly, that the reason these posters are not touching this thread is because there is no argument to be made...Officer Wilson did not commit a crime and the evidence backs that.

So all that is left is to grasp at straws. The B team...made up of protestors who have admitted they don't care what the evidence shows, MSNBHEE HAW, modern day carny barkers like Al Sharpton, and lower tier left wing PAtnet posters.

errc says

The libbies sent in their b team? What is that even supposed to mean?

I'm politically agnostic and could fart something more interesting then the group of squid arguing for an expansion of the govt and larger police state. You'd have to be an idiot of epic proportions to root on the police

Did you even read dodgertardjohn? The guy is likely retarded with his nonsense

Btw, where did ANYONE in this thread argue for an expansion of the police state?

The Michael Brown incident was about an officer acting in self defense. The only witnesses that contradicted that have been shown to be lying about the incident.

Now...THAT is my strong point!

tatupu70 says

I know you're being ridiculous,

One ricochet...one missed...still opinion, although a rather strong one...
unless you are saying "recovered from the body"....then it's a fact.
tatupu70 says

but if there were 5 bullets recovered from 5 bullet holes in a body, I would consider a statement that he was shot 5 times as a fact.

That depends on your religious beliefs, and your definition of "deceased"...

tatupu70 says

Are you happier with--it's a fact that Michael Brown is deceased?

Yeah....that.

dodgerfanjohn says

What SoftShell meant is that there are left leaning posters here at Pat.net that have the professional knowledge to address this thread, but are choosing not to. SoftShell is hypothesizing, probably correctly, that the reason these posters are not touching this thread is because there is no argument to be made...Officer Wilson did not commit a crime and the evidence backs that.

dodgerfanjohn says

What SoftShell meant is that there are left leaning posters here at Pat.net that have the professional knowledge to address this thread, but are choosing not to. SoftShell is hypothesizing, probably correctly, that the reason these posters are not touching this thread is because there is no argument to be made...Officer Wilson did not commit a crime and the evidence backs that.

So all that is left is to grasp at straws. The B team...made up of protestors who have admitted they don't care what the evidence shows, MSNBHEE HAW, modern day carny barkers like Al Sharpton, and lower tier left wing PAtnet posters.

I don't know if you're including me in this rant, but you are completely clueless. You're obviously incapable of nuance and lack the ability to understand the fundamental issue that I'm trying to make. If we allow DAs to act as pawns of the police, making no effort to do their job in front of a grand jury, aren't we one step closer to a police state?

How is it possible to move any closer to a police state

This is already a full blown police state. And there's no shortage of idiots lining up to support the end of freedom

Call it Crazy says

What the hell are you talking about? All the DA did was present witnesses, evidence and all types of other info to the GJ. That IS his job!!

No, that's not his job. His job is to get a conviction (or indictment in this case).

Call it Crazy says

If you have issues with the outcome, go contact those 12 people.

Not sure how many times I can state this. I DON'T have an issue with the outcome. I have an issue with the process.

If you think this is how DAs act for all criminals that are up for indictment, then I can't help you. A DAs job is to get an indictment and conviction. Period. It's not to do the defense attorney's job for him. And that's why I challenge you to find ANY other case where the accused is allowed to speak for 4 hours in front of a grand jury.

errc says

How is it possible to move any closer to a police state

This is already a full blown police state. And there's no shortage of idiots lining up to support the end of freedom

No one in their right mind should wish for a police state, but at the same time we must recognize that there are nefarious people out there who won't hesitate to murder if they can snatch a $100 - these 2 forces must be reconciled. We cannot have anarchy as long as this second category of people exists.

Call it Crazy says

Do you want Grand Juries to be eliminated and we go directly to the hangings and guillotines?

Are you on crack? I want DAs to be separate from police.

Call it Crazy says

The accused is always allowed to speak at a GJ. In many cases, the defense lawyer is against it (if he thinks his client is guilty), but in this case, no laws were broken so Wilson decided to talk to the GJ.

Uh, I don't think you have any idea what a grand jury is. Here's a quick primer for you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_juries_in_the_United_States

"Grand jury proceedings are secret. No judge is present; the proceedings are led by a prosecutor;[16] and the defendant has no right to present his case or (in many instances) to be informed of the proceedings at all"

From your source:

Is McCulloch’s decision to present all of the evidence to the grand jury controversial?

Yes.

Richard Kuhns, an emeritus professor at Washington University Law School, questioned McCulloch’s approach. “Since he presumably doesn't do this with other cases, the not-so-hidden message must be ‘don't indict.’ One more reason why McCulloch should never have been in charge of the investigation.”

@dublin

Do you honestly think that there's people out there that would jig you for $100. But the police are here to keep is safe, And because of these police, we are kept safe?

I don't think that's anywhere in the same realm of reality. I honestly believe that this police state presence has probably never stopped one single crime from being committed. Not one potential victim has ever been spared, because of the existence of our police state

I'll take it one step further. I believe t that the police make us all much less safe, And their existence has resulted in unfathomable amounts of crime x and wealth destruction

Call it Crazy says

See, it's NOT about just trying to find the accused guilty but giving the GJ ALL the evidence to make a informed decision!

Your cluelessness never ceases to amaze.

The job of the GJ is to indict (or not). The job of the prosecutor should be to calibrate the charges to what they should be, i.e. if a legitimate case can be made, and then to make the case that this charge is justified. In this case I think that would be either 2nd degree murder, manslaughter, or possibly only criminal negligence.

It's pretty hard to argue that a case can not even be made that the cop was at least criminally negligent.

The grand jury isn't supposed to determine if he was, only if it is POSSIBLE that a convincing argument can be made that he was.

Or the same for manslaughter, that is if they had a prosecutor who thought Wilson should be indicted for something.

You're making that up. If he wanted to satisfy the natives as you say, there should have been a trial.

Instead, he basically tried the case all by himself, with the grand jury, while acting basically as the defense attorney with the goal of finding WIlson innocent. It may be true that he (with prejudice?) determined Wilson was probably totally innocent. But that would have probably included extremely stupid leaps, such as ruling out testimony from people who say Wilson shot at Brown while he was running, just because he wasn't hit from behind.

I notice dodgerfan still repeats this, after I mentioned an obvious fact, which is that Brown not being hit from behind does not come close to proving that WIlson didn't shoot at him while he was running away (WE KNOW HALF OF WILSONS SHOTS MISSED). Who knows, maybe the prosecutor is just as ill prepared to really look at the facts objectively as dodgerfan John is.

This was a fraudulent GJ according to many experts, including Supreme court justice Scalia and many others.

Call it Crazy says

Your racial bias never ceases to amaze!!

You're the one bringing race in to this. I'm not assuming that the cops incompetence or worse has anything to do with race. I do think it might have had something to do with why the cop was such pussy. Prbably lived a very sheltered life and was afraid of the scary black man. But who knows. I don't think it's particularly relevant.

There could not be a trial. Any charges brought against Wilson would be dismissed in preliminary hearing. Even the most anti police judge would not hold Wilson to stand trial.

I don't know why you slaps fail to understand this.

errc says

Do you honestly think that there's people out there that would jig you for
$100. But the police are here to keep is safe, And because of these police, we
are kept safe?

Yes, for some it will take even less than $100.

errc says

I don't think that's anywhere in the same realm of reality. I honestly
believe that this police state presence has probably never stopped one single
crime from being committed. Not one potential victim has ever been spared,
because of the existence of our police state

I'll take it one step further. I believe t that the police make us all much
less safe, And their existence has resulted in unfathomable amounts of crime x
and wealth destruction

The threat of imprisonment/punishment logically results in some people not committing crimes when they otherwise would. The effect is hard to quantify as you cannot interview people and since only 1 system can exist at a time controlling for country/culture, you cannot run experiments, but it clearly exists.

Unfortunately it does not deter all potential criminals given how many people are actually incarcerated, but it's simply a bigger problem mainly the fact that people learn definitions favorable to crime from their delinquent peer groups. In many countries, in the underclass one way to build prestige is to openly defy the law to prove toughness. Differential Association theory of crime explains this pretty well. Given this truth, the best that can be done is to lock up this "target market" and limit the damage to law obiding society until the necessary cultural change occurs.

dodgerfanjohn says

I don't know why you slaps fail to understand this.

Who doesn't understand that?? You are the one who completely fails to grasp the point--it's not that anyone here thinks Wilson is guilty. It's that the prosecutor clearly didn't perform his duty, instead doing everything in his power to get Wilson off.

It sets a very disturbing precedent.

tatupu70 says

dodgerfanjohn says

I don't know why you slaps fail to understand this.

Who doesn't understand that?? You are the one who completely fails to grasp the point--it's not that anyone here thinks Wilson is guilty. It's that the prosecutor clearly didn't perform his duty, instead doing everything in his power to get Wilson off.

It sets a very disturbing precedent.

So in your opinion the DA should have announced that no charges would be filed, correct? Cause that was the ONLY other option.

dodgerfanjohn says

Any charges brought against Wilson would be dismissed in preliminary hearing. Even the most anti police judge would not hold Wilson to stand trial.

Actually, I'm pretty sure that if a grand jury results in an indictment, they aren't also going to have a pretrial hearing. Also, just FYI cops can easily be found guilty of manslaughter. In this case (Brown/Wilson) it might have been a lessor charge that was appropriate, criminal negligence - in other words the cops incompetence led to someone being killed who shouldn't have been. IF you think a judge wouldn't even hear that, you're definitely not being honest or objective.

These are examples of cops actually being found guilty.

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Ex-Police-Officer-Found-Guilty-Involuntary-Manslaughter-188842921.html

http://www.yourhoustonnews.com/courier/news/conroe-police-officer-found-guilty-of-manslaughter/article_66196eb3-fcbc-5b7e-b184-9a7bfe67812f.html

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/09/oscar-grant-oakland-police-shooting

http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2014/09/detroit_police_officer_back_on.html

http://www.koco.com/news/oklahomanews/mid-del/jury-has-verdict-in-manslaughter-trial-against-former-del-city-police-officer/23171644

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/oklahoma-police-captain-guilty-of-manslaughter-in-teens-death/

Why do you hate the statements of witnesses who were truthful?

Why are you willing to dismiss more than half of the statements based on faulty logic?

The grand jury isn't supposed to try the case. When are you going to get that ?

dodgerfanjohn says

So in your opinion the DA should have announced that no charges would be filed, correct? Cause that was the ONLY other option.

Well, first, that wasn't the only other option. He could have behaved like a prosecutor and actually tried for an indictment. If the grand jury doesn't indict, fine. If it does, then you have a trial where Wilson would be found not guilty, if there was no evidence as you suggest.

But, if the prosecutor decided there wasn't enough evidence to indict, then present the evidence explaining why no charges were filed. Just like they did after the grand jury. It's a DA's job to determine whether or not to go to a grand jury--but once decided, the DA must do everything in his power to get an indictment. Using the grand jury as a trial jury and acting like a defense attorney shouldn't have ever been considered...

Tee Hee. Look who you have defending you Tat.

Call it Crazy says

The prosecutor decided to pass the decision on to the GJ. It's his duty to also pass ALL the evidence collected on to the GJ, not pick and choose only the evidence that supports an indictment.

This was badly mishandled.

Normally a Grand Jury does not have witnesses testifying, and reams of evidence. They determine if there is a reasonable case for going to court. The overwhelming majority of Grand Juries send the cases along, where the court can weigh all that "reasonable doubt" business and whatnot.

That is unquestionably what should have happened here. It is highly likely he would have gotten "not guilty" but society and justice would have been better served. Instead it reeks of hamhanded attempt to shove all this under the rug and hope everyone will just forget about it.

The real argument should be about why so many witnesses were caught lying. Why so many protestors don't care about evidence and don't feel any dissonance when they learn that their assumptions were wrong.

In any case, I expect cop-cams to be a double-edged sword. Rather than just 'keeping cops clean', these videos of questionable police-actions may very well just give the majority of Americans who never grew up in the ghetto a glimpse of how little respect some people have for the rule of law.

Where I grew up in Texas as a white kid, it wouldn't have mattered at all what race the cop was, if we responded with anything but "yes, sir" or "no, sir" to an officer, the conversation would have ended badly and swiftly.

Having since lived at 124th Street and Broadway near Harlem in Manhattan in the years before Julianni, I am no longer shocked by every other word in supposedly polite conversations (and in the presence of children) being "motherf----r". Even there however, no one spoke like that near a police officer, let alone AT a police officer.

We are headed for a total disrespect for the rule of law - from the poorest to the president. Race is just an excuse.