WASHINGTON — The Justice Department cleared a white former Ferguson, Mo., police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old Wednesday but also issued a scathing report calling for sweeping changes in city law enforcement practices it called discriminatory and unconstitutional.
The dual reports marked the culmination of months-long federal investigations into a shooting in August that sparked protests and a national dialogue on race and law enforcement as the tenure of Attorney General Eric Holder, the first black person to hold that office, draws to a close.
The decision not to prosecute Darren Wilson, the white officer who was cleared in November by a state grand jury and has since resigned, had been expected.
To win a federal civil rights case, officials would have needed to prove Wilson willfully deprived Michael Brown of his rights by using unreasonable force. Instead, the report found no evidence to disprove Wilson’s testimony that he feared for his safety during the Aug. 9 confrontation. Nor were there reliable witness accounts to establish that Brown had his hands up in surrender when he was shot, Justice Department lawyers said.
A second scathing 102-page report, also released Wednesday, highlighted widespread racial bias by the 72-member Ferguson Police Department and described a system of using law enforcement to extract money from black residents, a practice Holder called “revenue generation through policing.”
The investigation found that Ferguson officers competed to see who could issue the largest number of citations during a single stop. In one instance, that total rose to 14. Even minor code violations sometimes resulted in multiple arrests, jail time and payments that far exceeded the cost of the original ticket.
“Seen in this context, amid a highly toxic environment, defined by mistrust and resentment, stoked by years of bad feelings and spurred by illegal and misguided practices, it is not difficult to imagine how a single tragic incident set off the city of Ferguson like a powder keg,” Holder said Wednesday.
Justice officials personally met with Brown’s parents Wednesday morning to notify them of the department’s findings.
“Today we received disappointing news from the Department of Justice that the killer of our son wouldn’t be held accountable for his actions,” said Lesley McSpadden and Michael Brown Sr. in a statement. “While we are saddened by this decision, we are encouraged that the DOJ will hold the Ferguson Police Department accountable for the pattern of racial bias and profiling they found in their handling of interactions with people of color.”
While nights of protests over the shooting drew hundreds of protesters in recent months in Ferguson, only about 30 braved sub-freezing weather Wednesday night to gather outside the police station, at times blocking traffic. Four people who refused multiple warnings from police to clear the road were handcuffed and taken into custody at about 10 p.m.
Justice Department investigators came to their conclusion after canvassing more than 300 homes and reviewing physical, ballistic, forensic, medical and crime-scene evidence. They also examined Wilson’s personnel records, audio and video recordings and the transcripts from the proceedings before the St. Louis County grand jury.
“The promise I made when I went to Ferguson and at the time that we launched our investigation was not that we would arrive at a particular outcome but rather that we would pursue the facts, wherever they led,” Holder said.
The Justice Department made 26 recommendations for the police department and municipal court, including a “robust system of true community policing” and new hiring practices to recruit minority officers.
Ferguson Mayor James Knowles, a Republican, said at a news conference that his police department is determined to address racial discrimination charges.
Justice officials also released seven racist e-mails written by Ferguson police and municipal court officials that they said indicated “intentional discrimination.”
A November 2008 e-mail, for instance, stated that President Barack Obama could not be president for long because “what black man holds a steady job for four years.”
The Washington Post and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
