On August 9th, in a Missouri town of about 21,000, a police officer stopped 18 year-old Michael Brown and his friend. It was one of 5,400 stops the Ferguson Police Department conducts every year, but at the end of it the unarmed Michael Brown was dead, shot several times by Officer Darren Brown.
Accounts vary. According to the Ferguson Police Chief, Brown lunged for the officer's gun and was shot in the ensuing struggle. Dorian Johnson, Michael Brown's friend and the only surviving witness says that the officer attempted to choke the victim and proceeded to shoot him when Brown pulled away.
Locals were upset after Brown's body was left in the street for four and a half hours. No ambulance was called. Detectives weren't even called to the scene for over an hour. That night, police armored up, assuming the worst from passionate, public protests. The next morning it became obvious that the meager trust between the police and the community was thinning.
