The Ferguson, Missouri thread

[archibaldcrane]

Not from ferg is very much not from ferg

[djzombie]

It was probably mentioned earlier in this thread but something like half of Ferguson's revenue comes from those low-level traffic tickets.

I feel like the result of not being able to pay those tickets(not getting the tickets themselves, obviously if you got a speeding ticket you were probably speeding) is basically the criminalization of being poor.

I've had a similar experience in the past where I got pulled over for an expired registration(because I didn't have the money to renew it right away), they towed my vehicle, gave me quite a few tickets, between the cost of the towing/storage and the tickets it caused us to have to break our lease on our apartment and move out.

Most people I know are living paycheck to paycheck and don't have really any kind of savings should something like this happen. It is not an uncommon occurence. I really felt like I was being punished because I was poor.

[kuronosan]

Shouldn't have been highwaying in a danger zone.

[Dimmauk]

They towed your car for expired registration? Sorry but I've never heard of that happening for something so minor.

[Xno Kappa]

Had no idea Benzino was even still alive lol. Everybody coming out the woodwork to get some relevance.

[NynJa]

They towed your car for expired registration? Sorry but I've never heard of that happening for something so minor.

Probably more to that story, or the vehicle was very expired.

[Kohan]

Probably more to that story, or the vehicle was very expired.

You know, if you're going to sit here and use Google Maps to post some contradictory shit about whether the people arrested in Ferguson qualify as being from Ferguson or not, you could at least research this too instead of being lazier when it suits your bias.

You can be towed for having expired registration. Just because a cop won't do it once doesn't mean there is anything wrong with their deciding to do so, especially considering liability issues.

[djzombie]

Only a month expired when it was towed, valid insurance, drivers license and inspection. Cop was just lookin to bend me over, and so he did, motherfucker didn't even buy me dinner first.

[tyven]

Had no idea Benzino was even still alive lol. Everybody coming out the woodwork to get some relevance.

yo benzino is on a reality show with ghostface, he got shot by a family member at the funeral of another family member a lil while back

[notorious bum]

No matter how tame and uneventful Ferguson has become, the police department just can't get it...

ShordeeDooWhop ‏@Nettaaaaaaaa 38m

The police literally have #Ferguson blocked off. The residents are trapped. What if someone needed something brought to them?

ShordeeDooWhop ‏@Nettaaaaaaaa 41m

"We're only letting #Ferguson residents in. Then YOU get out the streets too sir.


Tim Pool ‏@Timcast 59m

Teacher raises nearly $80,000 to feed Ferguson kids who can’t get meals at shuttered schools http://wapo.st/1piUqqs

Jeff Bernthal ‏@JeffBernthal 36m

Sen. Claire McCaskill is walking West Florissant. She is encouraging people to shop #Ferguson..

Kinda hard to shop when you're poor and can't go to work...

[kuronosan]

The cops have ways of shutting that down, obviously.

[6souls]

[notorious bum]

Decent group of protestors out now on W. Flourissant, despite the blockade.

[6souls]

Canadian journalist who was arrested on Tuesday was arrested for asking Capt. Ron Johnson a question

A Canadian television journalist was among several other journalists arrested Tuesday night in Ferguson, according to the Canadian network CTV news.

Tom Walters, CTV's Los Angeles Bureau Chief, was arrested under the order of Capt. Ronald S. Johnson of the Missouri Highway Patrol. It was captured on video by a CTV news cameraman. Walters reported that Tuesday night, before the last demonstrator had left, police insisted media leave first. Walters approached Johnson and asked why. “Captain Johnson, what's the reason for ordering the media out?” he asked as Johnson walked on the street with other officers. “Arrest him, arrest him,” Johnson can be seen saying. “I just asked a question!” Walters said over and over as other officers detained him.

“Now when a town fears brutality by law enforcement, and police suddenly want to do their work unseen by media observers, it's not just a fair question but a necessary one,” Walters said later in his own television report about the arrest.

He was released the next morning without being charged, according to the account.

Ken White, 50, who traveled to Ferguson from British Columbia this week to experience the events in Ferguson first-hand, recognized Walters from television and had been watching him work Tuesday evening. He also witnessed the arrest.

“I was very shocked with the behavior” of Johnson, White said. “He could have said to Tom Walters 'we're a little bit busy now, you can come to our press conference.' It's just unbelievable , your state patrol. Our police would not act like that.”

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/c...ce=twitterfeed

[6souls]

Wednesday Recap

A grand jury heard evidence for the first time Wednesday in the case of the shooting death of unarmed African American teenager Michael Brown at the hands of white Ferguson, Missouri police officer Darren Wilson. Protesters and clergy members, meanwhile, descended on the Buzz Westfall Justice Center to call for St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch to be removed from the case. McCulloch has deep family ties to law enforcement; his mother, brother, uncle and cousin have all worked for the St. Louis Police department.

Standing outside the justice center, the demonstrators chanted, “Hands up, don’t shoot.” As lightning flashing overhead, dozens of police and correction officers, nearly all of them white, could be seen inside the building watching the demonstration through the glass windows. On the concrete where the demonstrators stood, “BLACK LIVES MATTER” was written in green, pink and blue chalk, surrounded by stencils of splayed out bodies.

Even as Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon announced today that he was recalling the National Guard, Ferguson remained on a razor’s edge. A funeral for the dead teen has been scheduled for Monday, and is expected to draw a massive turnout. While the eleventh day of demonstrations ended without tear gas or violence, criticisms of the police response to protest, and to the slow progress on the investigation into Brown’s killing, continue to mount.

Attorney General Eric Holder visited Ferguson Wednesday, telling reporters that “few things have affected me as much” as his visit to the St. Louis suburb. “I am the attorney general of the United States, but I am also a black man,” he told a gathering at a local community college, adding that he understands the “mistrust” certain communities often feel towards law enforcement. Holder also held a meeting with FBI agents currently investigating the shooting.

When Holder met with Missouri Highway Patrol Capt. Ron Johnson, who has taken the lead in managing law enforcement here, he greeted him with a hug. “You are the man,” Holder told Johnson.

Johnson has garnered praise from many for his brand of public engagement during the unrest. But he has also fielded critical questions over law enforcement’s treatment of media covering the demonstrations. More than a dozen journalists have been arrested covering events in Ferguson, including this reporter. Johnson apologized for that arrest today.

“I’ll tell you that we had heard that some journalists had been arrested,” Johnson told me in an interview, explaining that some violent protestors had been posing as journalists in order to avoid arrest. “We’ve stopped many individuals with phones who say they were journalists, that we say, ‘Okay, where are your credentials?’ ‘Oh, I don’t have any.’ ‘Well, who do you work for?’ And they name some company that doesn’t exist.”

“It’s a tough situation, so I apologize,” Johnson added.

Wednesday night was among the calmest since the demonstrations began–only six arrests were made, compared to dozens in preceding nights. But it wasn’t without incident—one officer was suspended Wednesday for pointing his gun at numerous demonstrators and members of the media the previous night. During the incident, which was captured on video, the visibily agitated officer pointed his gun at a man and said, “I will fucking kill you.”

On Wednesday afternoon, members of the media descended on a Ferguson church amid reports that the site, which activists had been using to distribute supplies to treat tear gas exposure, was raided by police. Activists told The Intercept that police entered the church with a building inspector, but it was not immediately clear whether the authorities confiscated any of the supplies. Individuals involved with operations at the church said police have been parking outside since it was advertised online as a “safe space” days ago. Multiple activists described the police presence as an act of “intimidation.” The St. Louis County Police Department released a statement yesterday evening saying, “Officers on the scene advised there was no animosity between the police or the representative of the church.”

As yesterday’s demonstrations began to wind down after midnight, a short, slim 18-year-old African American man named Leon Nelson appeared on the main street of W. Florissant Ave., the epicenter of the protests, with a large open wound on his right cheekbone. Nelson was quickly surrounded by reporters and cameras.

Nelson, who graduated high school this year, told the press that on Tuesday night, amid one of the more intense moments of the evening, he was thrown to the ground by police, on top of broken glass, punched in the face, and kneed twice in the head before being arrested. ”I was in the parking lot and I guess a kid threw a plastic bottle towards a police officer. Next thing you know they just start chasing everybody,” Nelson told The Intercept. “I started running, I turn around, I see six officers behind me with a taser aiming at my back.”

“They grabbed me, threw me on the ground where the glass was at and I told them, ‘I surrender, I didn’t do nothing,’ and they punched me in my head while I was in handcuffs and they threw me in the paddywagon,” he added. Nelson said he was held until 4 a.m. and charged with refusal to disperse. Nelson–whose account was supported by his cousin Isaiah Danfort, also present last night and the night before–said the incident would not prevent him from protesting.

“I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing,” said Nelson, who added that he had met Michael Brown a handful of times. “It’s not going to stop me.”

“I just hope everybody see the real real, see what we going through in St. Louis,” Nelson said, telling the press that racist policing is a fact of life for young people like him. “All of us have went through it all, so that’s why I’m right here, right now, standing with the protesters for Mike Brown, because that could have been me dead right now, over something that stupid.”

“I’m showing respect and I’m getting justice,” he said.

Nelson didn't have the opportunity to ask Capt. Johnson for an apology, and none was offered.

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2...son-wednesday/
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/mic...police-n183911
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/0...n_5696164.html
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/08/19/ferguson/
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/mic...rguson-n185331
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/0...n_5695732.html

Bonus: How to deal with Tear Gas
http://38.media.tumblr.com/fc7707d5d...f68ao1_400.gifhttp://33.media.tumblr.com/35e3f888a...f68ao2_400.gif

Two ways of dealing with tear gas grenades from comrades in Turkey: Either submerge them in water. Make sure you can close off the container cause the gas will still spread for a while. Or throw them in the fire so the gas burns off before it can spread.

http://hypocrite-lecteur.tumblr.com/...f2013-hayakata

[notorious bum]

Just keeps getting worse for Ferguson PD's actions/inactions:

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 21m

Today the @aclu_mo won the lawsuit & the @stlcountypd gave ALL records/incident reports of the Michael Brown murder
ACLU of Missouri @aclu_mo
In response to our lawsuit for #MikeBrown shooting report, STL County Police Dept released: http://bit.ly/1q15tTT pic.twitter.com/VYupLYTxTh

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 23m
Last week the @aclu_mo sued the @stlcountypd for the release of all incident reports on the murder of Michael Brown.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 20m
What they gave the ACLU not only shocked them, but legal analysts all over the country. This is it. 1 page. No info.


Shaun King @ShaunKing · 18m
It is now being reported that fellow officers and the union lawyer for the @stlcountypd told them to NOT complete one. At all. Nothing.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 20m
Not only did Officer Darren Wilson NOT complete an incident report on the murder of Mike Brown, NO OFFICER completed a report. ZERO.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 16m
Without one single report, written by one officer, even from the homicide division, they are now left to create their own narrative at will.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 17m
Furthermore, the report they were forced to give to the @aclu_mo was just written on this past Tuesday & includes nothing but a date/name.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 14m
Beyond it being beyond standard operating procedure, they WROTE NOTHING of the timeline, what happened step by step, etc. NOTHING.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 15m
I just heard a bi-partisan panel of legal analysts say they have NEVER heard of no report, by anyone, at all, being created like this.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 12m
Today, a 4th eye witness, Michael Brady, confirmed alongside Crenshaw, Mitchell, and Johnson that Johnson was shooting @ the back of Brown.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 9m
All 4 eyewitnesses now confirm that Brown DID NOT charge @ Officer Wilson.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 9m
All 4 eyewitnesses now confirm that Wilson was running, chasing, and shooting at the back of Brown.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 5m
I've said this ALL DAY LONG, but give me ONE REASON, other than racism, why any person of reason thinks ALL FOUR WITNESSES are lying. Just 1

Dude going HAM right now, venting on twitter

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 21s
And now, over $200,000 has been raised, w/ 1,000+ full on racist comments on @GoFundMe for Darren Wilson. It's ugly right now. Damn ugly.

Shaun King @ShaunKing · 12s
Even though the @GoFundMe campaign violates 2 levels of their Terms of Service, they choose to keep it because they make money off of it.

[Quicklet]

Holy shit. If that (on top of everything else) doesn't scream civil rights investigation by the DoJ into the entire St. Louis County PD, I don't know what does.

[kuronosan]

Hooooooly shit.

[Scythiroth]

Well, they're screwed.

[Lucavi]

Are they? When have facts ever got in the way of a good screwjob and smear campaign?