Ghost of a Rider
Gold Member
Which means you can't prove he had them up either.
It's pretty evident they weren't.
Many of these witnesses denied incontrovertible evidence that Brown reached into the police car, struck Wilson in the face, was wounded by a gunshot inside the car, fled 180 feet, suffered no wounds in the back and then moved back at Wilson immediately before the fatal shots.
In many instances, the discounted witnesses repeated what they had heard from neighbors or on the news. Some witnesses admitted they made up stories so they could be part of a big event in their community.
Brown’s companion, Dorian Johnson, and friends quickly spread the word that Wilson had killed Brown execution style. An iPad recording and videos that captured conversations among the gathering crowd document the development of the false narrative.
When confronted with the ways in which their accounts differed from evidence, many witnesses acknowledged that they had made up details they hadn’t witnessed. Eight of the 22 eventually admitted they had lied about all or part of what they had claimed to see.
In addition to the eight who admitted lying, one woman admitted blacking out, a man admitted he may have hallucinated details and another woman broke into hysterics and was unable to give a cogent account.
Another witness had bad eyesight, another memory loss and psychiatric problems, another was fiddling with a cell phone camera and yet another was a regular protester who waited seven months before reporting anything and then admitted she was upset “Darren Wilson got away.”
Most of the rest of the 22 witnesses who said Brown’s hands were up gave accounts that were so at odds with physical evidence that they were not credible. Several swore that Wilson shot Brown in the back, even though there were no wounds in the back. Several said that Brown was kneeling and Wilson killed him execution style. Other witnesses claimed to see multiple police officers at the scene and multiple police cars.
None of that was true.
Credible witnesses
Sixteen witnesses gave consistent accounts that did not contradict forensic and physical evidence.
Of the 16, 10 said they saw Brown’s hands and that he did not have them up in surrender mode, although several of these credible witnesses described some movement of the hands.
Of the 10 credible witnesses who saw Brown’s hands, seven said he did not have his hands up in surrender. The other three said he briefly began raising them when he turned around after fleeing, but put them down and moved quickly toward Wilson.
The three eyewitnesses who saw Brown briefly raise his arms were part of an interracial family riding in a minivan. The daughter, 26, said that “for a second” Brown began to raise his hands as though he may have considered surrendering, but then quickly “balled up in fists” in a running position and “charged” at Wilson in a “tackle run,” while Wilson backed up.
Her mother, 51, who was driving the van, said Brown’s hands went up “for a brief moment,” but when Wilson told him to “get down” Brown put his hands down “in a running position.”
Another daughter, 31, said Brown briefly put his hands up but then put them down and began stumbling toward Wilson.
The father in the family, 45, said Brown’s arms briefly “flung out” as turned back toward Wilson, but Brown “did not have his hands up” despite what the neighborhood said.
Two of the other witnesses described Brown making a different motion with his hands as he turned back toward Wilson. They were a married, African-American couple watching from a nearby second-floor balcony.
Both said Brown looked down at his hands – one of which was bleeding -- but he did not raise them in surrender. The husband said that when Brown turned he looked down at his hand and put his hands out, palms up as if asking “What the heck?” before moving “quickly” back toward Wilson.
The DOJ report noted that a number of the witnesses who said that Brown had his hands up maintained that he fell to the ground with his hands still in that position. In fact, Brown had his left arm under him, consistent with Wilson’s account that he grabbed his trousers as he rushed back at him, causing him to fear he might have a gun.
![]()
Why did the Justice Department conclude that 'Hands Up, Don't Shoot' was a myth?
Why did the Justice Department conclude that Michael Brown didn’t cry out “Don’t shoot” and that, if he had his hands up, it was only for a moment before…news.stlpublicradio.org
So, many of the witnesses that stated his arms up admitted they were lying. The others were proven they were lying. They had an iPad audio of the crowd admitting to making the story up. There was no possible way Brown could have been shot with his arms up since his one arm was underneath his body when he fell. They said they seen cop cars and other police when Wilson was actually alone during the shooting. They said that Brown never reached into Wilson's police car and was shot in the hand which of course had to happen because of Brown's blood inside the cop car. So what the justice department determined is you had a bunch of lying lowlifes making these claims, and it was Obama's Justice department led by Racist Holder.
Yeah, I read through the report some time back and I've told all this to Joe already. But you know how he is; he simply called into question the veracity and validity of the DOJ report because they always run cover for the officers. It probably never occurred to him that it was Obama's DOJ.
Joe has demonstrated time and time again that he will say anything, ignore anything and conflate anything to keep his narrative going. He has no shame, no dignity, no honor and no scruples.