“Defend himself from what?” Lesley McSpadden exclaimed as she listened to a radio broadcast of St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert P. McCulloch. “From what?”
It was part of the prosecutor’s attempt to justify the grand jury’s decision not to indict Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson for the August 9 shooting death of her son Michael Brown Jr.
Tears fell from her face and rage echoed in her voice as she stood with protestors in front of the Ferguson Police Department on the night of Monday, November 24.
“They want him back in Ferguson,” she said of Wilson. “I can’t get nobody back. They wrong. Y’all know y’all wrong,” she said, pointing to the police department. And if it’s anybody out here that don’t think so, I don’t give a [expletive].”
She was once again forced to grieve before the world as she listened to the radio broadcast – and it was as if she learning that her son was killed all over again.
“Everybody want me to be calm, but do you know how those bullets hit my son?” McSpadden said. “Do know what those bullets did to his body … as they entered his body? Ain’t nobody had to live through what I had to live through.”
People wailed with her from the crowd – and voiced their support as family members wrapped their arms around McSpadden when it appeared that her body would give at the weight of the news.
“We’re here for you, sister,” an older woman yelled from the crowd as McSpadden sobbed. “We’re here for you, and we love you.”
And just like that, the earth shattered again in Ferguson.
The lowest common denominator of the subsequent reactions will get plenty of attention – the looting, burning, vandalism and arrests of those erroneously lumped in with the masses of peaceful protesters.
Talks of the impact on the Ferguson community as businesses burned along a significant stretch of West Florissant Avenue have been continuing since not long after McCulloch announced that there would be no indictment.
But the biggest collateral damage as the fires raged in Ferguson was the collection of fragile hearts that broke more quickly than the storefront glass that crunched along the sidewalks of South Florissant Road later that night.
Before the more dangerous element did their worst, there was a collective of spirits whose idealism refused to allow them to believe anything other than that justice would prevail.
“I thought he was going to be indicted,” Gabby Davis said, shaking her head.
She assumed she was coming to the long-standing protest hot spot to celebrate.
“I really just thought it was going to be right and that somebody would be on our side and say the right thing,” Davis said. “Now I feel there’s no such thing as justice.”
Unlike the typical commanding presence during their nightly face offs with Ferguson police, there was an initial disheartening resignation as protestors tried to let the fact that Wilson would not be indicted sink in.
“I’m in disbelief, actually,” said Tiffany Nashville. “I think we all felt like we knew this was going to happen, but there’s that Christian side of me that felt like ‘God isn’t going to let that happen.’ And after I heard Lesley speak on Saturday, she was just so faithful and was like ‘y’all gotta stay faithful with me.’ And I was like, ‘If the mama can be faithful, then who am I not to have faith?’”
As recent as an hour before the announcement, there was a completely different energy from protestors. They marched from The Ferguson Police Department to the intersection of Hereford Avenue and Airport Road as if it were a victory lap. They blocked traffic with their familiar chant, “If we don’t get it, shut it down.”
But by 9 p.m. somber protestors stood in place, while others wandered back and forth wondering what to do next.
“Watching her on the car, it just brings tears because that was her son,” Nashville said. “Darren can come back to work tomorrow if he wants to. Her son can’t come back.”
Tears flowed down Nashville’s face as she struggled to finish her statement.
“It’s not over. I’m still faithful. We didn’t get this indictment right now, but it ain’t over because God’s got the final say,” said Kimberly Turner. “Whatever comes from this, justice will be served. We’ve got to change these laws, change this system. We’ve got to get in the system to change it. We’ve got to make our own change. But even with this case right here – it ain’t over.”
“I still have a knot right here,” Charli Cooksey said. “My heart is heavy, even though it was like we knew it was coming. I am a little worried that some of us are going to lose hope as a result of this. I just want us to keep hope and a sense of urgency.”
Tension had grown to a boiling point. Rage got the better of some individuals, who began lashing out – which had a ripple effect that ultimately wreaked havoc on Ferguson Monday night and into Tuesday morning.
“The way I see it is that people have lost faith in the system, and sometimes it seems like it’s justified to lose faith in the system,” said Stefan Bradley, a professor at Saint Louis University. “What occurred was something that people were prepared for, but when it really happens, it feels like it’s a punch in the gut. You start to wonder, ‘How much do black lives matter?’”
Bradley said the non-indictment raises serious questions.
“You think about what needs to happen for an officer to be indicted – because right now, nobody knows,” he said.
“If eyewitness testimony doesn’t do it, if video doesn’t do it, if pictures don’t do it, then what? You start to wonder if there’s a difference between the law and justice – and that’s the danger of the whole thing.”
By evening’s end, a small group had fulfilled the prophecies of those expecting the worst.
Police cars burned. Tear gas was again deployed. Core businesses within a community went up in flames. St. Louis County reported more than 60 arrests.
“Last night was a disaster,” Colonel Ron Replogle, Commander of the Missouri Highway Patrol, would later say in a press conference.
Peaceful protestors were once again lumped in with looters conducting criminal activities as yet another tragic moment in Ferguson was played – and replayed – before a global audience.
But no one’s loss of faith in the system at the present moment could rival that of Michael Brown Jr.’s family – his mother, in particular.
“They think this is a [expletive] joke,” McSpadden said, clearly speaking of those who have actively sought to criminalize her son as justification for his death. “But y’all want to come with y’all [expletive] up comments. They still don’t care. They ain’t never gonna care.”
