If the prosecutor doesn't want to prosecutor, there should be neither a trial nor a grand jury. As it is, you had: 1. A prosecutor who has significant connections in the police department and a dad who was a cop shot by a black man. 2. A grand jury that lasted months, whereas they normally last days. 3. A grand jury that was presented with all sorts of conflicting evidence, instead of the minimum necessary to establish a case. 4. A defendant that was put on the stand. 5. A prosecutor that left it entirely up to jury to decide on charges, instead of making a recommendation. None of these things is normal for a grand jury. If you're going to say that the grand jury was established to placate people, that's fine - but then you have to conduct it the way a grand jury is normally conducted. As it is, when you create a grand jury proceeding in the name of "fairness", and then design it specfically to fail, it just serves as more evidence that the legal system does not work properly in cases like this - the underlying complaint that caused all the controversy in the first place. This is a good article op-ed on the topic: http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/24/opinion/reyes-ferguson-grand-jury/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
Sounds like it was a hybrid between a grand jury and a trial. If grand juries were presented with only evidence to indict, that seems a bit unfair towards the defense. But like I said, it sounds like the prosecutor wanted to lay all the evidence out for twelve people to decide whether or not to indict without officially going to trial yet. It does look unfair for the prosecution to require that you need a panel of 12 jurors to agree to indict, and then another panel of 12 jurors to convict. The prosecutor probably felt there was never enough evidence to indict, but if he did that, then there would be more distrust of the system and talk about the blue line. But then, you could suppose that if he had nothing to fear, then why not indict and go to trial? There's still a chance that Wilson could have been convicted if this had truly gone to trial, and going through a trial is unfair to Wilson when there was no evidence that he had violated policy. I still believe he chose the best situation of all the worst options, and that the outcome reflects the evidence the best. I agree that the prosecutor may not have followed the most conventional procedure, but this was no ordinary case.
How many NON-Policeman do you think have gotten this 'Courtesy'? That is POWER . .. the POWER to basically decide guilt or innocence without any oversight Rocket River
Will any of these dumbass "witnesses" face jail time for lying? It's obvious some of these people aren't very credible.............
plenty of self defense shootings never see a grand jury. I think police have a huge advantage with a built in defense fund though. A regular shmo would need tens of thousands if their case sees a grand jury.
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Damn, Major, you're on a roll. And I'm glad you are, considering that some of the folks here are repeatedly calling the people in the streets of Ferguson "animals" and a "lynch mob." Agree or disagree with the actions of some of the citizens of Ferguson (and I am completely against the violent rioting that has occured, being an advocate and past practitioner of peaceful protest), they are not animals and are certainly not a "lynch mob." In fact, calling the rioters a "lynch mob" is an insult to Black Americans, considering that there is a long history of Blacks being lynched by Whites in the United States, unless there was a lynching in Ferguson that I haven't heard of. Keep it up!
Stop using the term orientals before you tell people to not say lynch mobs about crowds of people burning their town and calling for a man to be killed.
your defense of using the term by saying that is what you have always said was special. The new term is asian. Now you know. What is the new term on the euphemism treadmill for lynch mob? I will gladly use it.
It not only seems unfair. It IS unfair. But that's the way the grand jury system works. I served on a grand jury for a month and I think every single person who came before us got sent up on athe least one felony charge. That's the way the system, which is rigged in favor of the DA, works in nearly every single case except for this one. Apparently because the prosecutor decided to cut the accused a break. That's a travesty. If he didn't want to bring a case he is free to refuse to proceed. Sure he'd have to take the heat, but thats the job. Instead he ran a sham grand jury proceeding, seemingly to avoid blame.
Well, that's what they are, they are a bunch of animals that formed a lynch mob, they are no different than the white lynch mobs in the historic south trying to string someone up. Fortunately we have better security now so they won't get the blood they are calling for.....which is why they are rioting. They should be embarrassed by their actions but I seriously doubt they are self aware enough for that.
Yeah, Ok. Lynch mob is not exclusive to black people. There were plenty of people of all races hanged. You would fit right in with that crowd ... making everything about race.
Protester my ass <div id="fb-root"></div> <script>(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));</script> <div class="fb-post" data-href="https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152717406341336" data-width="466"><div class="fb-xfbml-parse-ignore"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152717406341336">Post</a> by <a href="https://www.facebook.com/FoxNews">Fox News</a>.</div></div>
Also of note, that lynch mob out there isn't comprised of solely one race, but it is comprised of people who don't want justice, they want Wilson's head on a spike. In fact, justice was served in this case by letting the innocent man go free and that only incited the mob to riot....it's pretty clear what they wanted.
A SamFisher response without a sense of condescending insults? Color me shocked, this deserves a response. I think we can agree that this is a very special case, and a very high profile one. The prosecutor would not have indicted based on what was presented, and I agree that he deflected the blame onto twelve grand jurors. Can't really blame him if I were in his shoes. If an overwhelming amount of grand juries indict, does that mean this one has to? Are there no grand juries where all the evidence isn't laid out for the grand jury? And is there a rule that says a grand jury cannot have defensive evidence? It's a high profile case that shouldn't be decided unilaterally. Are you guys mad that Wilson wasn't indicted, or that the grand jury wasn't a typical conventional grand jury?
The problem that some have is that the process was fair rather than it being stacked against the innocent man like a lot of indictment proceedings are. They got the decision right and justice was served and that's what pisses certain people off.
