On Monday evening, Nov. 24, the week of Thanksgiving, the St. Louis County
prosecuting attorney released the findings of the grand jury in the case of
Officer Darren Wilsons shooting and killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.
As expected, the grand jury chose not to indict Wilson, and, predictably, there
were massive demonstrations against police brutality across the country on
Tuesday, Nov. 25.
In Minneapolis there were a couple of hundred demonstrators in front of the
Third Precinct station at Lake and Minnehaha. The crowd was large enough that
some of the demonstrators spilled over onto the street. Traffic moving east on
Lake Street was driving around the demonstrators using the left lane. There was
a white van stopped in the right lane. There were four lanes for eastbound
traffic: a right turn lane, a right lane, a left lane, and a left turn lane.
Jeffrey Patrick Rice, 40, driving a blue Subaru station wagon, pulled up behind
the white van. Instead of detouring around the van to the left, Rice drove into
the right turn lane and directly into a crowd of demonstrators. He bumped them,
hit them with his car and knocked them down. He drove over the legs of a
16-year-old demonstrator. He stopped. Demonstrators beat on his car to stop
him from driving his rear wheels over the demonstrator. Rice drove forward
again, hitting more demonstrators. Breaking free of the crowd, still in the far
right lane, he almost collided with another car in the intersection. He changed
lanes in the intersection and continued driving down Lake Street to St. Paul.
He called 911 to report damage to his car from the demonstrators. The police
came. In their initial report the police called Rice the victim in the
incident.
KSTP had been filming the demonstration, and almost immediately a film of the
incident got onto YouTube and went viral
https://www.youtube.-com/watch?v=pn79ClrnY_0. It is ironic that KSTP started
the Pointergate scandal by accusing Mayor Hodges of using gang symbols when
she was encouraging young blacks in North Minneapolis to vote in the last
election. At the time, many people thought KSTP was unfair and contributed to
racist stereotypes. But, now, KSTP presents critical evidence of injuries to
people protesting racial injustice. Soon after it had become obvious that
everyone knew exactly what had happened, the police changed their report to
list Rice as a suspect.
The police have presented their evidence to Mike Freeman, the Hennepin County
attorney. Freeman will assemble the evidence and determine whether laws have
been broken. He will then have the option of either dismissing the matter or
presenting a bill of indictment against Rice to a district court, or he could
present the facts in the matter to a grand jury to see if they return a bill of
indictment.
Of course, the function of a grand jury is to give credence to a decision thats
already been made by a prosecuting attorney. A good lawyer never asks a
question for which he doesnt already know the answer, and a district attorney
wont bring a case before a grand jury if he doesnt already have a clear idea
what the verdict will be.
The prosecuting attorney in the Ferguson case had merely to establish that
Darren Wilson felt his life was in danger. If Officer Wilson could convince a
grand jury that he believed his life was being threatened by Michael Brown,
then a grand jury would be bound to support an officers right to defend
himself. Wilson made a fundamental procedural mistake in not waiting for backup
and pursuing on foot a dangerous suspect, but if a grand jury can believe that
Wilson acted on a belief his life was in danger, then the grand jury will not
indict him.
This is an important similarity to the Rice case. Mike Freeman and/or a grand
jury will have to determine what Jeffrey Rice was thinking on Tuesday
afternoon, Nov. 25. Rice will claim he didnt know what was happening. In an
interview in the StarTribune, Rices mother has already said he was coming home
from work and didnt even know what was going on. And when he stopped and the
demonstrators pounded on his car, he continued driving to protect himself. Like
Wilson, he could claim self-defense.
One of the first questions a prosecuting attorney must ask Rice is where does
he work? What time did he leave work? Was it logical for him to be on Lake and
Minnehaha at that time? Or, was his accident with the demonstrators planned and
premeditated?
Did Rice believe that since Wilson got a free pass to kill young black men,
then, like George Zimmerman killing Trayvon Martin and Darren Wilson killing
Michael Brown or the Minneapolis Tactical Squad killing Terrance Franklin, all
you had to do was claim you feared for your life and you were free to murder
the monster that frightened you?
People who live in the shadow of a mountain do not understand the darkness.
When the sun has risen for the rest of the world, they are still in night. But
if they look back and watch the sun come over the mountain, they can see the
shadow of the mountain grow smaller. They have that moment to understand their
darkness and their mountain.
Racism is a mountain of ignorance in the white community. Hatred and fear of
black people causes white people to fumble around in darkness, make serious
mistakes in judgment and strike out at anything unknown or different. We all
have a responsibility to move that mountain.
Message to demonstrators: You went to the demonstration to change the world.
Well, changing the world doesnt happen in one day. Its a long process. Its a
lifetime commitment. We need you to stay in the struggle for the long haul. If
you want to work for justice in Ferguson, then you have to be willing to work
for justice in Minneapolis, and that means contacting the County Attorneys
Office and providing evidence and testimony aiding in the prosecution of
Jeffrey Rice. If you were at the demonstration, if you saw what happened, or if
you were struck by Jeffrey Rices car then please call the Office of the County
Attorney and testify to the truth of what happened: 612-348-5561.
Ed Felien
<email obscured>
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