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Michael Brown shooting: Attorney General Eric Holder heads to Ferguson, Missouri
Protestors in Ferguson, Missouri. PHOTO/Charlie Riedel/AP
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder met with community members in Ferguson, Missouri, on Wednesday and vowed a thorough civil rights probe into the fatal police shooting of an unarmed African American teenager that has set off 12 nights of racially charged protests.
Holder, spoke in person with students and then community leaders at a community college during a visit to Ferguson for a briefing on a Justice Department investigation into the August 9 killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown.
He later met privately with Brown’s parents at the St. Louis U.S. Attorney’s Office, but no details of that session were immediately available.
Also on Wednesday, a grand jury investigating the fatal shooting began hearing evidence in the case, though protesters stepped up their demands that the local criminal inquiry be turned over to a special prosecutor.
Before a briefing at local FBI headquarters, Holder said the thrust of his department’s probe differed from the investigation conducted by local authorities. “We are looking for violations of federal, criminal civil rights statutes,” he said.
The Justice Department is seeking specifically to determine whether federal prosecutors can bring criminal charges against Darren Wilson, the police officer who shot Brown, for violating Brown’s civil rights by use of excessive force.
His visit came hours after dozens of protesters were arrested in the latest street disturbances. Many of the protests have been peaceful, but others, especially smaller ones late at night, have been punctuated by looting, vandalism and clashes between demonstrators and police.
The turmoil has cast the St. Louis suburb of 21,000 people into the international spotlight as a symbol of often troubled U.S. race relations. Ferguson is predominantly African American, but its police force, political leadership and public education administration are dominated by Caucasian Americans. Activists and demonstrators have complained that Brown’s death was the culmination of years of unfair police targeting of black people.
An hour before sundown on Wednesday, a few dozen protesters began marching peacefully along a main thoroughfare that has been the scene of nightly demonstrations and sporadic violence. The group chanted: “Hands up, don’t shoot,” which has become demonstrators’ rallying cry, as they moved along a street fronted by businesses with boarded-up windows and the ruins of a gasoline station burned out in a previous night of unrest.
Among students meeting with Holder at St. Louis Community College was Molyric Welch, 27, who said her brother died three years ago after Ferguson police used a stun gun on him. “A lot has happened here,” she said. “Holder promised things were going to change.”
But Melvin Brown, 61, a pastor visiting Ferguson from Rockford, Illinois, to support the protests, was skeptical. “I don’t have any faith in it,” he said. “The whole system is corrupt.”
St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Bob McCulloch said his office could continue presenting evidence to the grand jury – which meets once a week – through mid-October as he confronts conflicting pressures for speed and thoroughness.
“There is no trust in Bob McCulloch,” said Clinton Stancil, senior pastor of Wayman AME Church in St. Louis. “We are seeking justice. We don’t think he can be fair.” McCulloch has repeatedly promised a fair and impartial investigation.
Accounts of Brown’s slaying differ. According to police, Wilson reported that Brown reached into the policeman’s cruiser when Wilson approached him on the street, then grabbed for the officer’s gun.
A companion of Brown said the teenager was initially shot after the officer tried to grab him through the car window and again after Brown staggered back with his hands in the air.
Holder said during his visit that he had assigned the most experienced agents and prosecutors to the investigation. Hundreds of people have already been interviewed and federal medical examiners have performed an independent autopsy, the third conducted in the killing.
The case has reignited a national debate over racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system and has drawn sharp words from top U.N. officials and human rights groups about police tactics and respect for civil liberties.
Source: Reuters