Woman Denies Sending Tweet Regarding Ferguson Grand Jury

On September 18, 2014, I wrote a post about Darren Wilson testifying before the St. Louis County grand jury. Darren Wilson is the Ferguson police officer who, on August 9, 2014, shot 18-year old Michael Brown 6 times, twice in the head. Witnesses say that Darren Wilson shot several times as Michael ran away and it appeared that Michael had been shot. He turned around and with his hands up in the universal position of surrender. Wilson proceeded to fire until Michael was dead.

 Grand juries are presented evidence by the prosecution. The accused are not present. The job of the grand jury is to see if there is sufficient evidence to indict. It is not a trial where the accused gets to appear and defend him or herself. There are reports that St. Louis County State’s Attorney McCulloch invited Wilson to testify before the grand jury.   Having no written report by Darren Wilson, the grand jury could only hear Wilson’s side of the story from his own mouth, but that is not standard procedure as the state does not (or is not suppose to) represent the accused.

In the September 18^th post, I wrote that grand juries are secretive. From that perspective, the person who leaked information about who appeared before the grand jury violated the confidentiality of the grand jury system and in doing so, betrayed public trust. It was and is my opinion that the grand jury’s investigation should be closed due to breach of confidentiality and turned over to the federal government.

Yesterday, reports came out that someone on Twitter claimed having a friend on the grand jury who was giving her information about the Wilson investigation. Activist Shaun King received information, took screenshots of the tweets, and reports that the Twitter account was soon deleted thereafter.

Somehow, CNN was able to identify the account holder and talked to her on the doorstep of her home.   The person who posted the tweets now says that her Twitter account “…had to have been hacked.”

These tweets came at the same time that Ed Magee, the spokesman for McCullough’s office, told the media that “The investigation has been basically completed that is being conducted by both the FBI and St. Louis County PD.”

When considering that information was leaked regarding Darren Wilson testifying before the grand jury, and now tweets saying that the person has a friend on the grand jury who says there isn’t enough evidence to arrest Wilson, there is definitely someone leaking confidential information.

Here’s the problem. State’s Attorney McCullough has taken over investigating the matter.

“The matter has been referred to the prosecuting attorney for investigation,” said a statement from the St. Louis County court administrator. “The court will hear the matter and take appropriate action, if the prosecutor finds cause to believe misconduct has occurred.”

McCullough did nothing when grand jury information was leaked that Darren Wilson testified before the grand jury, so why he should now be trusted to investigate this matter of further alleged leaks? McCullough is involved in organizations that are raising money for Darren Wilson. He is not impartial.  McCullough’s agenda is apparently to not have Wilson indicted, so he could care less about leaked information as long as it does not interfere with reaching his goal.

I know enough about how authorities get around things.  To make it appear that the decision of the grand jury was based on evidence,   they simply argue that the leaked information did not interfere with the grand jury’s investigation.  The real issue is that a grand juror has breached confidentiality.  It is my impression that the citizens of Ferguson have tired of the smoke and mirrors.  McCullough needs to step down.