After months of silence, Ferguson, Missouri police officer Darren Wilson gave his own account of the Michael Brown shooting and insisted that he did everything he could to keep the teen alive.
In an unusual step after a grand jury decision, photos, transcripts and other evidence that was presented to the grand jury in the case of Michael Brown’s death were released for the public to sift through for themselves and while the evidence does support some of Wilson’s claims it also exposed some major issues with the Ferguson police department and the entire investigation.
For the first time since Brown’s death, Wilson is giving his own account of the story behind those photographs.
Much like the grand jury’s decision not to indict Wilson, the interview didn’t come with any real surprises.
Wilson reiterated claims that Brown was charging at him during the time of the shooting and insisted that even after a barrage of gunfire Brown showed no signs of slowing down.
“I started backpedaling, ‘cause he’s just getting too close and he’s not stopping,” Wilson said during the interview with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News. “After I fired the second round of shots, he gets about eight to 10 feet [away]. And as he does that, he kinda starts to lean forward like he’s gonna tackle me. And eight to 10 feet is close and what I saw was his head. If he’s gonna tackle me, he’s gonna tackle me at that point. And I looked down my barrel of my gun and I fired.”
Wilson also said that Brown started behaving aggressively before he even had the chance to step out of his vehicle.
“I got on the radio and I asked for assistance,” he said.
Wilson then claimed to have called for police backup before attempting to step out of his vehicle. That’s when he says Brown slammed his car door shut.
“I…again taken aback because I’ve never been trapped in my car,” Wilson said. “I use my door to try and push him back and yell at him to get back. And again he just pushed the door shut and just stared at me.”
After a short stare down, Wilson claims, Brown started throwing punches and the incident escalated from there.
“The reason I have a clean conscience is ‘cause I know I did my job right,” Wilson said.
Brown’s parents beg to differ.
“I don’t believe a word of it,” said Lesley McSpadden, Brown’s mother, during an interview with the Today Show.
McSpadden said the interview was “disrespectful” and “added insults to injury.”
“He didn’t do what he had to do, he did what he wanted to do,” McSpadden said. “I don’t think he wanted to kill my son, but he wanted to kill someone.”
Meanwhile, the physical evidence released to the public unveiled some new information.
While at least six shots hit the unarmed teen, a dozen shots were fired in total during the encounter.
Brown’s blood was also found on officer Wilson’s weapon.
That evidence does seem to support accounts of an altercation happening while officer Wilson was inside the vehicle.
Perhaps even more substantial, however, were transcripts of Wilson’s testimony, which may have exposed even more serious flaws in Ferguson’s police force as a whole.
Many people questioned why Wilson did not use a stun gun on Brown rather than firing multiple times at the teen. As it turns out, he didn’t have one and many officers on the force don’t.
“We only have a select amount [of stun guns],” Wilson said. “Usually there is one available, but I usually elect not to carry one. It is not the most comfortable thing. They are very large.”
In other words, the alternative to deadly force other than a can of pepper spray was sitting back at the police station and begging the question as to why officers are allowed to “elect not to carry one” and why the department doesn’t seem to have a sufficient amount of them available.
It seems as if Wilson, who admittedly never even used his gun before, should be a primary candidate for carrying a stun gun if he doesn’t have much experience with a deadly weapon.
The evidence also exposes tons of mistakes and careless decisions that were made during the investigation.
The physical evidence revealed that no fingerprints of Wilson’s gun were taken, Wilson was not required to immediately hand his gun over to investigators and investigators never took measurements of the likely distances between Wilson and Brown.
