This Article is From Mar 05, 2015

Wilson is Cleared of Rights Violations in Ferguson Shooting

Wilson is Cleared of Rights Violations in Ferguson Shooting

Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson during his medical examination after he fatally shot Michael Brown (AP Photo)

Washington:

The Justice Department has cleared a Ferguson, Missouri, police officer of civil rights violations in the shooting of Michael Brown, a black teenager whose death set off racially charged and sometimes violent protests last year.

The decision, which was announced Wednesday, ends a lengthy investigation into the shooting last August, in which Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Brown in the street. Many witnesses said Brown had his hands up in surrender when he died, leading to nationwide protest chants of "hands up, don't shoot."

But federal agents and civil rights prosecutors rejected that story, just as a state grand jury did in November. The Justice Department said forensic evidence and other witnesses backed up the account of Wilson, who said Brown fought with him, reached for his gun, and then charged at him. He told investigators that he feared for his life.

"There is no evidence upon which prosecutors can rely to disprove Wilson's stated subjective belief that he feared for his safety," the report said.

The report found that witnesses who claimed that Brown was surrendering were not credible. "Some of those accounts are inaccurate because they are inconsistent with the physical and forensic evidence; some of those accounts are materially inconsistent with that witnesses' own prior statements with no explanation," it said.

"Although some witnesses state that Brown held his hands up at shoulder level with his palms facing outward for a brief moment, these same witnesses describe Brown then dropping his hands and 'charging' at Wilson," it added.

"Those witness accounts stating that Brown never moved back toward Wilson could not be relied upon in a prosecution because their accounts cannot be reconciled with the DNA bloodstain evidence and other credible witness accounts."

Unlike the state investigation, the Justice Department's inquiry produced a lengthy public report explaining the legal conclusions and its analysis.

From the beginning, civil rights charges represented a difficult hurdle for prosecutors to clear. The law requires prosecutors to prove that Wilson willfully violated Brown's civil rights when he shot him. Courts have given officers wide latitude when deciding when to use deadly force if they feel their lives are in danger.

The shooting report is separate from a broader civil rights investigation that found widespread civil rights abuses by the Ferguson Police Department.

A report from that investigation found a wide pattern of discrimination by the city's police force, and said that city officials had sent racist emails on their government accounts. One depicted President Barack Obama as a chimpanzee. Another included a photo of topless African women with the caption, "Michelle Obama's high school reunion."

"It is time for Ferguson's leaders to take immediate, wholesale and structural corrective action," Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said in a statement accompanying a separate report on the Ferguson police. He was expected to make remarks Wednesday.
 

© 2015, The New York Times News Service
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