Ferguson MO grand jury no bills the officer that shot Michael Brown

[Peter Lemkin]

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: On Tuesday, the family of Michael Brown held a press conference at a church not far from Ferguson. Michael Brown Senior was present but did not speak. He wore a red St. Louis baseball caps and much of the one his son had on when he was killed by Officer Darren Wilson, and a T-shirt that read No Justice No Peace. The first speaker was the Brown family's attorney Benjamin Crump, who blasted St. Louis County prosecutor Bob MucCulloch's handling of the evidence before the grand jury, leading to the decision he announced Monday night.

BENJAMIN CRUMP: Attorney Gray and Attorney Darryl Parks and myself we objected back in August to this prosecutor. We even wrote a letter to Governor Jay Nixon requesting a special prosecutor to be appointed. We objected when he informed us the process that he was going to use that was different than anything else, different than any normal grand jury that you would have presented. And now after we watched him last night and his comments, we strenuously objected to this prosecutor and this process. But this morning, after we, like all of you, went through as much of the information I think it was described as a data dump we went through as much of it as we could and saw how completely unfair this process was. We object publicly and loudly as we can on behalf of Michael Brown Junior's family that this process is broken.

The process should be indicted. It should be indicted because of the continuous systematic results that is yielded by this process. And let's be very honest. Let's be very honest about this process. We have the local prosecutor who has a symbiotic relationship with the local police and the local police officers who sit in judgment whether they indict the police when they brutalize or kill a young person from our community. Normally, that prosecutor has no relationship or no regards for the young person of color. And so, as Attorney Gray, Attorney Parks predicted at the beginning, we could foresee what the outcome was going to be. And that is exactly what occurred last night.
AMY GOODMAN: That's Benjamin Crump, the lawyer for Michael Brown Jr.'s family, speaking Tuesday at the Greater Saint Mark's Church in Ferguson. Democracy Now! was there on the streets and then inside the news conference to ask questions after the Reverend Al Sharpton spoke.

AL SHARPTON: Three days after Michael Brown Junior was killed, we had a major rally in this very church. We said that night, with his parents present, that we had little to no faith in the grand jury by the local district attorney. We said that night that we wanted the federal government to come in. That Sunday we had a unity rally where thousands came and joined us. We repeated it. And all the way through the funeral where I eulogized. Last night, the appearance by the district attorney made it clear to everyone why we had little faith in a state prosecution. I have been out involved in civil rights all my life. We have seen cases go ways that we felt were right and ways that we felt was wrong.

I have never seen a prosecutor hold a press conference to discredit the victim. Where he went out of his way to go point by point in discrediting Michael Brown Jr., who cannot defend himself. How do you, in explaining why you're not indicting a man that killed, try and convict the young man for shoplifting that can't explain the tape, try to convict him for interfering in the police car when you don't hear his side of the story. Have you ever heard a prosecutor go in a press conference to explain to the press why the one that did the killing is not going to trial, but the victim is guilty of several things that no one has established? It also was very strange to us that he lectured the media a media that he and others had no problem with when you leaked the video tape of Michael Brown in the cigar store or in the convenience store, a media that you had no problem making all kinds of favorable stuff for the prosecution, a media you had no problem leaking things for the officer. So, it seems to me that he has had the use of the media, then has a strange decision in a town that has been tense, in a town that has been forecast to have all kinds of problems, his solution is, let's announce it at night after dark. Let's make sure that all the kids are home, that all the students are back for Thanksgiving break, and it's dark outside. And we gonna announce it and then I'm going to get up in the dark and castigate the character Michael Brown Jr.
I think that it was the responsible. I think that it was unnecessarily provocative. But, I think it only cleared why many of us said, let's go to the federal government from the first place. He implied last night that the federal government and the state investigation ran hand-in-hand and ended last night. That is not the case. The Attorney General has released a statement saying the federal government investigation continues in the killing and in the review, and Mr. MucCulloch's statements last night are led others to believe differently. Let me be very clear that we were not surprised at what the outcome was. Certainly, it is painful for the mother and father, certainly, there will be emotional reaction. I've never seen a case where there wasn't. You are dealing with their flesh and blood. But, let the record be clear, you have broken our hearts, but you have not broken our backs.

AMY GOODMAN: Two quick questions. Yesterday, the grand jury handed down it's decision. In Washington, President Obama awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom to the civil rights activists Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman who their killers were not indicted by the state but by the federal government. Are you hoping for the same thing here. And number two, last night, as we covered the protests in front of the Ferguson police station, it was packed with riot police, state troopers were there, all the advanced weaponry was there. When we went over to West Florissant and expected to be stopped there by the police as we were at the protests months ago, it was wide open. We saw no state troopers and we hardly saw police. Do you think the authorities let Ferguson burn?

CROWD: Yup, yeah, yes, yes! [Clapping]

AL SHARPTON: Well, let me say to the first part of your question, because I think the second question has been answered. The first part of you question, it is and you are probably more aware than most of the media, if not all that are here it has been the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement that you always had to go to the federal government and could not depend on states. Whether it was Goodman, Chaney or Schwerner, whether it was Michael Brown Jr. So, we are not in a strange place. We had hoped we'd be in a different place, but it's not strange. And I think that it is interesting that on the day that Goodman, Chaney and Schwerner were given the Medal of Freedom was the day that McCulloch decided, in the dark hours, to announce the state decision on the Michael Brown case, and eight years ago today, Sean Bell was killed by police in New York. So, all of these things come together. But, I think the lawyers have stated the legal case. I say that many of us from Marc Morial and Cornell Brooks and all of us, this is not our first rodeo McCulloch. We will deal with this in a way civil rights leader have.