On Saturday in Ferguson, Missouri, an unarmed, 18-year-old African American named Michael Brown was shot and killed by a white police officer. Though there are conflicting accounts of what transpired, witnesses have told reporters that the victim held up his empty hands at the time of the shooting.
On Sunday, there was some looting among protesters, and last night’s scene was ugly, with the police using tear gas and non-lethal rounds in the hopes of dispersing “a restless crowd.”
In a second night of violence, streets were closed off around a gas station store in Ferguson, Missouri, that had been burned on Sunday. Police told crowds and reporters to leave the area. A shoe store was looted, according to NBC station KSDK. Ferguson Police Chief Tom Jackson told The Associated Press that officers responded after gunfire came from the crowd.Fifteen arrests were made. St. Louis city alderman Antonio French posted a series of videos and pictures on Twitter documenting the police response. Young people were seen holding their hands up in the same manner that some witnesses have suggested Brown was at the time of the shooting. Police said Brown, 18, was shot after a physical confrontation with an officer. Brown’s family disputes that account and their attorney Monday said the teen was “executed in broad daylight.”
A report from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch characterized tensions as “high and raw,” though the report added that “by midnight, the situation was quiet.”
This morning, msnbc ran a report based on an exclusive interview with Dorian Johnson, Michael Brown’s friend who was there during Saturday’s shooting. “I saw the barrel of the gun pointed at my friend,” said Dorian Johnson, 22. “Then I saw the fire come out of the barrel.” He added that “what began as an order by a police officer to ‘get the f— onto the sidewalk’ quickly escalated into a physical altercation and then, gunfire.”
Rachel had more last night on developments, including the FBI’s role in investigating what transpired.
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Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."