Police in Missouri came under pressure on Friday to explain why they released surveillance footage appearing to implicate a teenager in a robbery that took place minutes before he was shot dead by an officer on patrol, after giving conflicting accounts of whether the events were connected.
Thomas Jackson, Ferguson’s chief of police, said at a press conference that the officer – named for the first time as Darren Wilson – did not know that Michael Brown, 18, was a suspect in the theft of cigars from a convenience store shortly before the encounter last Saturday afternoon.
At the same time he disclosed the officer’s identity, the police chief released surveillance footage and an incident report detailing how Brown had allegedly stolen from the store and physically confronted a member of staff. The move was described as a “character assassination” by lawyers for the Brown family.
Jackson first indicated that the officer stopped Brown in response to a callout over police radio describing the suspect for the robbery. Yet at a second press conference on Friday, Jackson said that the “initial contact was not related to the robbery”.
Brown was stopped because he was walking down the middle of the street, obstructing traffic, the police chief said.
Later still, Jackson was quoted by the St Louis Post-Dispatch as saying that Wilson saw cigars in Brown’s hand and realised that he might be a suspect in the robbery.
Attorneys for the Browns said that the family were “beyond outraged” at the simultaneous release, describing it as a strategic move to smear their son.
“There is nothing based on the facts that have been placed before us that can justify the execution-style murder of their child by this police officer as he held his hands up, which is the universal sign of surrender,” the lawyers said in a joint statement.
Jackson said the report was released in response to freedom of information requests by media outlets, apparently following tip-offs. Such requests can often take weeks or months to be fulfilled.
His decision was also criticised due to the refusal by police to disclose comparable details about Brown’s shooting, despite this information being subject to similar records requests.
Dennis Parker, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s racial justice program, said Jackson had made a “one-sided and piecemeal disclosure of potentially irrelevant and prejudicial information while continuing to withhold the critical police incident report that the public has demanded”.
Captain Ron Johnson of the Missouri state highway patrol, who won plaudits for his handling of the demonstrations after being handed control on Thursday, said he “would have liked to have been consulted” about the simultaneous release of the report of the name and alleged robbery.
“The information could have been put out in a different way,” Johnson told reporters and residents at a press conference that unfolded more like a town hall meeting on Friday. “I would have communicated it differently,” he told the Guardian afterwards.
The disagreement over Friday’s decision highlighted the overlapping jurisdictions of the law enforcement agencies involved. The robbery report was released by Ferguson city police, the force that employs Wilson, which has come under sharp criticism for not reflecting the racial makeup of the city, which is majority African American.
The inquiry into the shooting is being led by St Louis County police, which led the policing of the demonstrations over Brown’s death through several nights of violent clashes, before being relieved by Missouri governor Jay Nixon on Thursday.
The FBI is also investigating whether the shooting breached civil rights. It announced late on Friday that agents would be “canvassing the neighbourhood” over the next few days to find new witnesses.
Control of the security for protests was handed to Johnson and the state highway patrol, whose dramatic shift in tactics away from a hardline response was credited with allowing the calmer atmosphere on Thursday night.
Nonetheless, residents expressed fury at Johnson on Friday over the actions of the separate city police force. “There’s a lot of evidence come out about [Brown’s] character, and what he was before the shooting,” said Carl Walter, 38. “Why is there not the same transparency about this officer? This young man lost his life.”
Nixon conceded at the same press conference that “certain things should have come out sooner than they did later”.
“New facts are out that weren’t out yesterday,” said Nixon. “But those are not the full picture of anything.”
He added: “Nothing should deter figuring out how and why Michael Brown was killed.”
According to the Ferguson police account of the robbery, witnesses told police that Brown stole several packets of Swisher Sweet cigars from a convenience store between 11.52am and 11.54am on 9 August.
Store surveillance footage shows that “an apparent struggle or confrontation seems to take place with Brown”, and then as he made to leave, an unidentified man tried to stop him. Brown pushed the man into a display rack, started to leave the store, appeared to intimidate the person one more time, then left, according to the report.
A friend, Dorian Johnson, was identified in the police report as being involved in the robbery. Johnson was also present at the scene of the shooting, which took place a few minutes later, and has spoken several times about the incident, contradicting claims by the police that Brown wrestled with Wilson before the shots were fired.
Jackson said on Friday that Wilson was treated for an injury suffered during his encounter with Brown. He had previously said the officer sustained a swollen face. Wilson was placed on administrative leave and is understood to be in hiding outside Ferguson.
Wilson was described as a “gentle, quiet man”. Asked how the incident had affected the officer, who has worked for him for four years following two in a neighbouring force, Jackson said: “Devastating, devastating. He never intended for any of this to happen.”
Adding further tension between the various authorities involved, county prosecutor Bob McCulloch, who would be responsible for bringing any charges against the officer, reportedly reacted furiously to Nixon’s transfer of the policing of the demonstrations. “It’s shameful, what he did,” McCulloch told the St Louis Post-Dispatch.
Nixon declined to respond to McCulloch’s comments on Friday. “We’re focused on our responsibility we have here,” he said.
St Louis County police have a warrant for computer hard drives and video from the convenience store involved in the robbery.
More than a dozen officers, including Johnson, the highway patrol captain, visited the store on Friday afternoon and talked with staff.
Jay Kanzler, a lawyer for the owner, who was not named, told reporters that it was a customer, not a member of staff, who called police last Saturday. He said the store had been part of the community for many years and knew many customers by name – but not Brown.
Kanzler gave no details of the robbery and attempted to distance the store from the aftermath. He declined to say if staff even considered the incident a robbery.
“Another customer called the police. My clients were served with a warrant for the video and hard drives and will comply because they have to,” he said.
Ferguson police collected video footage last Saturday, said the lawyer. He did not know if St Louis County police would obtain additional material via the warrant. He said the store staff would make no statement and asked the media to leave them alone.”My clients have nothing to do with this investigation.”
At the store, customers defended the owner. Eugene Ward, 43, clutching a bag of water bottles and beer cans. ‘They’re good people. I’ve known them for over 10 years,” he said “If the evidence shows that the gentleman was here and committed a crime that doesn’t change the excessive police reaction. But it also doesn’t condone what the young man did.”
Police at the scene declined to comment but one highway patrolman was heard telling a customer that the officer involved in the shooting appeared to have been a good man and that Brown’s death was a tragedy.
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