Like a moth to flame, Al Sharpton took to the microphone to denounce Ferguson prosecutor Robert McCulloch and the entire state prosecution and grand jury work in the Michael Brown case. The press conference was allegedly for the Brown family, not the MSNBC host and activist who owes millions in back taxes.
Sharpton accused McCulloch of putting Brown on trial, and trying to discredit Brown and several of the cases’s witnesses.
Then Sharpton made a claim that is unlikely to sit well with police officers unions or those who advocate for lowering standards for candidates to be accepted into police work.
Sharpton said that Officer Wilson is too small to be an officer.
“How do you have a man on the force that feels like he is a child up against Hulk Hogan?” Sharpton asked as those around him nodded in agreement. “So what kind of training and policing do you do?”
That is actually a good question, but logic doesn’t take it where Sharpton would like it to go.
Brown was 18 and large, at 6’4″ and just under 300 pounds. Officer Wilson, 28, said in his testimony that “when I grabbed him, the only way I can describe it is it felt like a 5-year-old holding onto Hulk Hogan.”
To Sharpton, that seems to be Wilson’s fault and should cause a re-evaluation of police procedures. But another reasonable interpretation of Wilson’s testimony is that he feared that Brown would easily overcome him in their physical struggle. Deadly force was therefore Wilson’s logical choice, especially if Brown reached for Wilson’s sidearm.
Wilson told the grand jury (his testimony itself an unusual move for a potential suspect): “At this point I’m like why isn’t this working, this guy is going to kill me if he gets ahold of this gun.”
What is a “child up against Hulk Hogan” supposed to do in that situation?
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