On August 25, I left St. Louis to depart for my semester abroad in Italy. Just 16 days prior, Michael Brown was shot dead 20 minutes north of my house.
I watched the events that day with three of my closest friends. Our high school classmates appeared on CNN, the nation was quickly swept into uproar and by nightfall riots broke out characterizing the city I grew up in as the cradle of our nation’s racial tensions. The overwhelming discomfort of the situation was only exacerbated by the fact that I was watching history occur in my backyard.
I don’t think that that characterization was wrong. I grew up in the suburb of Ladue, by every metric the demographic opposite of Ferguson. Yet, numerous aspects of the Michael Brown shooting resonated. Where I grew up, jaywalking is the crime you joked about in middle school. That was, until you started noticing that every Friday, only the black kids got pulled over crossing the street to Starbucks. Even in Ladue, youthful ignorance only lasted for so long, and it became abundantly clear that in St. Louis, a city defined by “white flight” more than any other in the country, life differs fundamentally based on the color of your skin.
I went into abroad with the expectation that I would be afforded the luxury of escaping life in America for four months. Michael Brown’s death made that impossible. I stayed up until 3:00 a.m. last night to hear the grand jury’s verdict, and since learning that a trial would not be pursued, I’ve been glued to my Facebook, Twitter and news feeds.
I do think that because I’m from St. Louis and because I’m seeing people from every facet of my home life articulate opinions I didn’t even know they had, the whole ordeal carries a greater weight. Amongst the many emotions I know myself, St. Louisians and Americans are feeling overwhelming anger.
And I don’t mean for that word to be stigmatized—I think it has been too closely correlated with the violence that has, tragically, broken out. People are angry, and they should be.
This case, regardless of its unknown verdict, needed to be heard in a courtroom. Whether it’s fair or not, the six bullets lodged in Michael Brown’s body manifest over a century of blatantly institutionalized racism, fear and inequity. This was about more than defining whether an 18-year-old was a legal “threat.” This was about giving a far too commonplace tragedy an uncommon chance to be addressed.
Perhaps more importantly, it is distinctly not a demand for the guilt of Darren Wilson. The evidence made available to the public—incomplete and disputed as it is—does not, and cannot, paint a clear picture of what happened. However, it’s hard to believe that after over 10 shots were discharged, six of which found their mark, and an unarmed kid lay dead, that this didn’t call for an indictment.
What makes this all exponentially more troubling is the history and nature of grand juries, both generally and in similar situations. A more famous legal colloquialism goes, “a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich if you wanted it too.” The grand jury’s decision not to indict Darren Wilson falls out of line with an overwhelming tendency for grand juries to vote in favor of indictment. However, it does lend itself to the history of grand juries to not indict police officers.
It points a fixed eye on St. Louis’ longstanding lead Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch. Despite a largely well-regarded career, McCulloch has had distinctly controversial relationships in cases involving police officers, guns and young black men.
His father, a police officer, was horrifically murdered on duty by a young drug dealer with a knife. McCulloch was 12-years-old at the time. His family has served extensively in the force, and in 2000, a grand jury he called for famously decided not to indict a pair of police officers after they shot two drug dealers in a parking lot.
All those incidents bear the same intricacies and contentions that make the Michael Brown case so controversial today. However, it’s hard to believe that McCulloch doesn’t have skin in this game, and that his decision not to recuse himself—even at the behest of numerous legislators and activists—was the right one.
There’s a certain gravity to seeing everyone point their finger and gasp at the place you grew up in, knowing that on many levels their shock is warranted. People shouldn’t condemn the police force, our judicial system at large or even Darren Wilson. They should condemn the fact that Michael Brown and St. Louis aren’t getting their day in court. That’s the part that truly gets me, and that’s the part that will make it so hard for St. Louis to heal.
Caleb Ellis is a Trinity junior.
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