NYT Editorial: McCulloch needs to step aside in this case or be replaced with a special prosecutor

[kpete]

The Opinion Pages | EDITORIAL

A Fair Inquiry for Michael Brown
By THE EDITORIAL BOARDAUG. 20, 2014


.....

Justice is a process, and it won’t necessarily result in the arrest the officer who fired the fatal shots, as many of the demonstrators say they want. Witness accounts sharply differ on the events leading to the shooting, and it’s impossible to predict whether the grand jury that began hearing evidence on Wednesday will indict Mr. Wilson. But those in charge have an obligation to demonstrate fairness at every step, and that means there cannot be even a hint of bias in the process.

For that reason, the St. Louis County prosecuting attorney, Robert McCulloch, needs to step aside in this case, or be replaced with a special prosecutor by Gov. Jay Nixon. Mr. McCulloch’s parents worked for the St. Louis Police Department, and his father was killed on the job in 1964 by a black suspect while helping another officer. Last week he gratuitously criticized Mr. Nixon’s decision to put state police officers in charge of the response to the unrest.

A St. Louis Post-Dispatch investigation found that after a shooting in 2000, when two detectives shot two unarmed black men in the town next to Ferguson, Mr. McCulloch failed to bring any independent evidence to the grand jury. He claimed that “every witness” testified that the detectives were defending themselves, but secret grand jury tapes showed that several witnesses did not do so. When the grand jury chose not to indict, he said he supported the decision. That’s why many black elected officials — including Charlie Dooley, the executive of St. Louis County, where Ferguson is — have called for a special prosecutor in the Brown case, and more than 70,000 people have signed an online petition to that effect.


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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/opinion/a-fair-inquiry-for-michael-brown.html?_r=1

[99th_Monkey]

1. Thank you NYTimes! K&R ~nt

[Cha]

2. Sounds Fair.. but all the big shots from the Gov on down say Bob McCulloch is

fine where he is.

Thank you NYT, kpete.. and Good Luck to us all.

[HooptieWagon]

3. McCullough has a history of protecting bad cops.

See the Henry Davis case, where he refused to prosecute 4 Ferguson cops who wrongly arrested Davis in a case of mistaken identity, were informed by the booking officer at the jail they had the wrong man, savagely beat Davis who required hospitalization for severe head wounds, falsified their report, charged Davis for bleeding on their uniforms, then denied under oath in sworn depositions a beating ever occurred. That's the kind of cops McCullough protects. McCullough himself should be charged with violating civil rights, and conspiracy.

[RobertEarl]

4. The people of Ferguson have been very forgiving

They are done with that. Now they are protesting the injustice done to them.

The people of Ferguson are simply amazing in that they have suffered so much and they have been so peaceful. I bet the cops are quite surprised that cops can't continue with their abuse anymore.