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Prosecutor Releases More Documents Related To Ferguson Shooting

St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch announces the grand jury's decision not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the Aug. 9 shooting of Michael Brown, on Nov. 24.
Cristina Fletes-Boutte
/
AP
St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch announces the grand jury's decision not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the Aug. 9 shooting of Michael Brown, on Nov. 24.

St. Louis County Prosecutor Robert McCulloch made public nearly two dozen additional documents related to the investigation of police officer Darren Wilson, who fatally shot an unarmed black man last summer.

It was the second time in a week he had released more documents related to the Nov. 24 grand jury decision not to indict Wilson for the fatal August shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.

Among the new documents is a transcript of a police interview with Dorian Johnson, the young man who was with Brown at the time of the shooting.

The first batch of material was released shortly after the grand jury's decision. At the time, McCulloch had promised the release was the entirety of the documents related the case.

"Clearly, I inadvertently omitted some material" from the initial release, McCulloch said on Saturday. "I apologize for any confusion this may have caused."

In the transcript, Johnson tells detectives that in the Aug 24 shooting he heard four shots and that before he was hit, Brown raised his hands and shouted that he was unarmed.

"Once the officer fired the second shot at my friend Big Mike [Brown] I knew he was struck because he instantly stopped in his tracks," he said. "He stopped running. His hands were in the air before he turned around.

"My friend went all the way down in the fatal [sic] position," Johnson said. "I watched him take every, several more shots. I watched his facial expression."

The Associated Press notes:

"Johnson's account to investigators was generally similar to his later grand jury testimony, in which he portrayed Wilson as the aggressor during a struggle that began at the officer's vehicle and led to a brief chase before Brown's fatal shooting.

"In both his original interview and his Sept. 10 grand jury testimony, which was previously released, Johnson said that Wilson reached out of his vehicle window toward Brown's throat or shirt. During the ensuring struggle, Johnson said he never saw Brown touch Wilson's gun."

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Scott Neuman is a reporter and editor, working mainly on breaking news for NPR's digital and radio platforms.