Lawrence O’Donnell, an MSNBC dude, just revealed that the prosecutor’s secretary gave the jury an outdated statute that states that police officers can shoot and kill a fleeing suspect simply because they are fleeing. But that was ruled by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional in the 1970s. She gave them an updated copy. When the jurors asked her if Supreme Court rulings override state rulings (for which the obvious answer is yes), she told them “don’t worry about that” instead of saying yes. She told them that they could still use the outdated statute, but that something in it was wrong. She never told them what part of the statute was wrong. She just said “DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT”
SHE GAVE THEM AN OUTDATED STATUTE THAT SAYS A POLICE OFFICER CAN DO EXACTLY WHAT DARREN WILSON DID, AND INSTEAD OF TELLING THEM THAT THAT PART OF THE STATUTE WAS WHAT WAS INCORRECT, SHE TOLD THEM NOT TO WORRY ABOUT IT.
HERE IS A LINK TO THE VIDEO!!
This is how the Grand Jury arrived at their verdict. Early on in the proceedings, Assistant District Attorney Alizadeh handed out copies of a law that was ruled unconstitutional in 1985. In essence it set the bar for use of excessive force lower than is permissible. Simply put, ADA Alizadeh told the jury that it was permissible to shoot a fleeing suspect.
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Tennessee v. Garner made the statute Alizadeh distributed to the Grand Jury unconstitutional, but that didn’t stop her from distributing it to grand jurors at the outset in order to set their minds in a place where Darren Wilson was justified in what he did.
Then, at the very end of the proceedings on November 21st, Alizadeh “corrected” the record. Sort of.
For the entire proceeding, jurors weighed the evidence in light of a law that was deemed unconstitutional almost 30 years ago. Then they corrected the record at the very end