Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson has been
forced to admit that the surveillance video showing teenager Michael Brown allegedly stealing cigarillos from a convenience store was unrelated to the killing of Brown. During Friday afternoon's press conference, Jackson said that Office Darren Wilson did not not know about the robbery or that Brown was a suspect. He was harassed by Wilson because "he was walking down the middle of the street blocking traffic. That was it."
Here's the problem. In his morning press conference, Jackson very clearly implied that Wilson was looking for Brown on that Ferguson street. Here's the transcript of Jackson's words from this morning.
At 11.52, dispatch gave a description of a robbery suspect over the radio. A different officer arrived at the store where the strongarm robbery occurred.
A further description, more detailed, was given over the radio, and uh, stated the officer was walking toward—uh, the suspect was walking toward QuikTrip. Our officer left the sick call, he encoutered, uh uh, encountered the, uh, I’m sorry.
At 12.01 our officer encountered Michael Brown on Canfield Drive. At 12.04 a second officer arrived on the scene, immediately following the shooting and at 12.05 a supervisor was detached, dispatched to the scene, and subsequent officers arrived.
The officer who left the "sick call" was Wilson. Jackson is clearly connecting the two events here, the robbery, the dispatch call over the radio, Wilson leaving the call he was on and then encountering Brown. Clearly, that was bullshit. Why Jackson stood up in front of the nation on live television and put out this lie isn't clear. Incompetence? That's a given after what we've witnessed for the past week. Disinformation? If that wasn't the intent, it was the result.
It's time for some housecleaning in the Ferguson police department, starting at the top.