PICTURE THIS: These undated photo released by the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s office shows Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson during his medical examination after he fatally shot Michael Brown.
Darren Wilson, the white police officer who set off a national firestorm when he fatally shot black teen Michael Brown, will probably not want to return to his patrol job in Ferguson, Mo., but could end up working as a cop elsewhere, experts said.
“He’s very unlikely to lose his job,” said Howard Friedman, a Boston attorney specializing in civil lawsuits on police brutality. “Obviously he’d have a lot of trouble because he’s so well known in that town, but I don’t think they could fire him. It doesn’t mean he couldn’t be a police officer somewhere else because technically he would have a clean record.”
Wilson, who a grand jury failed to indict Monday night in Brown’s death, told ABC News yesterday that he has a clean conscience about Brown’s fatal shooting last summer because, “I know I did my job right.”
Although cleared of criminal charges, Wilson remained on paid leave yesterday as the Ferguson Police Department conducts an internal investigation of the shooting. Wilson and Ferguson cops also face a civil rights probe by the U.S. Justice Department and a possible civil lawsuit by Brown’s family.
Findings against Wilson in either probe are unlikely because of the high standard of proof, according to Tom Nolan, a Merrimack College criminology professor and former Boston cop.
“I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it’s probably not likely the Justice Department will sustain a civil rights charge against this officer,” said Nolan. “You have to go to mindset. How to prove what someone was thinking when they pulled the trigger?”
Wilson could return to work immediately if he is cleared in the internal investigation, said Lenny Kesten, a Boston attorney specializing in defending police officers against civil lawsuits.
But Kesten said not every officer cleared in a fatal shooting wants to return.
“There was a young man who was shot — a 16-year-old kid — and the officer retired,” said Kesten. “He couldn’t handle it. … Taking a life is a serious thing. No one ever hears about that.”
Boston Herald.com
