Michael Brown’s family attorneys held a press conference Tuesday, one day after a grand jury decided not to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of the Ferguson teen.
Attorneys Benjamin Crump and Anthony Gray were joined by civil rights leader Al Sharpton. All three denounced both the process that let Wilson walk free and the prosecutor in the case, Robert McCulloch.
Crump took the podium first, saying:
“We strenuously objected to this prosecutor and this process … This process is broken. The process should be indicted.”
Gray was equally critical of the grand jury process:
“We want equal process. We want justice.”
Gray later asked viewers to “hold out hope” for further investigations, strongly suggesting that the Browns would file a wrongful death civil suit.
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Michael Brown Jr.’s father Michael Sr. — who wore a “No Justice No Peace” t-shirt — was expected to speak, but did not. “He doesn’t want to misspeak because of such emotions that are going through him that will later be held against him,” Crump explained.
The night before, Brown’s stepfather Louis Head incited rioters by standing atop a car and shouting, “Burn this bitch down.” Over a dozen local properties were looted, vandalized, or destroyed after the grand jury’s decision was made public by McCulloch. Al Sharpton addressed the violence, which he called “destructive”:
“We condemn the violence and looting that happened last night, but we also condemn the violence that happened on Aug. 9 … If you’re on Michael Brown’s side, you walk with dignity. If you’re on Michael Brown’s side, you stand up with pride. If you do anything to harm others, you’re on your own side.”
Crump decried Head’s words, saying they were a result of “raw emotion” and “not appropriate at all.”
As a final call to action, Crump reiterated the Brown family’s request for peaceful protest and asked for legislation that all police officers carry body cameras for full transparency.
[Image via AP Images.]