People absolutely have the right to be angry at the looters and rioters. This is their community they are burning to the ground. I understand they are angry about the verdict. I think if more people understood how a grand jury worked this would help. The grand jury did not say the police officer was innocent. They said there was not enough evidence to prosecute. Grand juries do not decide innocence or guilt that is left to the court system. They make a recommendation as to whether to go forward with a trial. It doesn't matter anyway. Being angry over something does not give you the right to loot, riot, burn things, shoot guns into the air or at other people. These rioters need to take personal responsibility for what they are doing. My ex doesn't pay child support or spousal support because my state says he doesn't have to until the divorce is final. My ex fights me every step of the way while I try to file for divorce. Does that give me the right to burn down the capitol where they made the law or my exes house or car because he is an asshole. No it doesn't.

My dad is a police officer and if someone punched him repeatedly in the face and then lunged for his gun, you bet your ass I would want him to shoot. I don't care if it's an 80 y.o. white lady.

So, according to the self-appointed Facebook police: no bragging. No humble-bragging. No talking about your new possessions of any kind, because there are starving kids in Africa don't you know. Excessive baby posts/wedding posts/new home posts. No inflammatory or offensive (to me) opinions. No excessive whining and bitching. No oversharing. No excessive updates about your healthy lifestyle. No vaguebooking. No taking swipes at other people unless you want to share all the gory details. No chain letters or just believing every article you read without further research. Selfies. Duckface selfies. Overtly sappy posts about your OH. Ironic use of hashtags. Use of hashtags full stop. Umm...so basically, I can post internet memes and that's it?

OK, here's the thing about failing to indict Darrel Wilson: considering who he is and the documented corruption in the police department that he is both a member of and who investigated him, it was irresponsible to not return an indictment. Maybe at trial they would have found that there was reasonable doubt and not convicted him of anything. However, the nature of grand jury proceedings is essentially secretive. Trials are public. It makes absolutely no sense that a grand jury hearing evidence gathered by a competent, unbiased police department and presented by a competent, unbiased prosecutor could have found no probable cause. Yes, perhaps a petit jury would have found him innocent in the long run, but this is, on its face, a gross miscarriage of justice.

I have a friend whose daughter was sexually abused at a party by a neighbor. The family has taken the girl to counseling and contacted the authorities, but the police are not taking any action. There are several other kids who saw this incident happen and they can testify that he attacked this child. The man lives a few doors down from a school and the police told the mom to take the child and move. Why does she have to move? The mom is not making much money and can't just move her child. This sickens me.

I posted about learning the secret behind the car accident that killed my mother. I almost wish I hadn't read those reports, the injuries were horrific. I really didn't need to know all that. The coroners report was very detailed. I felt so sick and sad after reading all that and looking at the photos. And now I know- it all kind of makes sense the way my dad acted around her friend. We just never really saw her again even though she lived less than a block away and I, as a little kid, loved her like an aunt. And now I know - the guilt she must have felt - I can't even imagine. The police had to explain to her that the accident was her fault, she had no memory of it. That was in the report too. This is going to bother me for a long time, especially since I can't ask my dad why he lied to me. Why tell my siblings and me it was a drunk driver? And WTF!?! Do I tell my brothers?? I hadn't even thought of that! I'm freaking out. This is all just no good. I seriously wish I never opened that envelope. This sucks. All this happened more than thirty years ago but .. I dunno I'm just sick over this.

Since I was little, for over thirty years, I've been told my mother was killed by a drunk driver. This weekend I was going through a box of photos I got out of my dad's house after he died and at the bottom was an envelope. Inside was the police report, coroner's report, and photos. There was no drunk driver. My mother's best friend was driving the car (which I already knew) and she failed to yield at an intersection. They were t-boned on the passenger's side. I saw photos of the car. The reports described all my mother's injuries. There is no way she could have survived. She died in the ER. The report also said my father elected not to press charges against my mother's friend. I sat at my kitchen table and cried. I don't know for sure why or who I was crying for though.

Last night, after throwing a $300 party for my son, he demanded to spend a night his friend's. I told him that he couldn't, and he yelled and argued then slammed his door. Then he came out and did the same thing again. My dad (visiting for the party) made my son come out and grabbed him by the sweatshirt, telling him to be respectful to me and grateful for what I had done for him. The little shit called the police! They came out, heard all sides of the story, and chewed his ass for being a disrespectful, entitled little shit. The kid is going to be grounded for a long time, will have no access to any of his birthday gifts during that time, and I don't even know what else. I am SO done with him. (BTW, I recently confessed that I believe he is a sociopath.)

I used to work in a small college PR office. Any time any wrongdoing happens on campus, it's best not to bring in the police. Got to keep the enrollment up. We didn't have a cover-up policy as far as I knew. We didn't have a violent crime. But we did have calls from parents that made us want to tear our hairs out. The Ouija boards, you know, and the ghost in the dorm attic, and the professor who was a commie pinko socialist gay rights activist who shouldn't be talking about those things to dear little Susie, who was meanwhile screwing the whole basketball team.

I have been hearing a lot about "college rape trials". When a sexual assault allegedly occurs on campus, the school deals with it??? Why is it not a police matter like any other crime? I can see where the school would be involved with the question of what to do about the accused attending school, but it sounds like they determine guilt/innocence? Has anyone heard of this and can shed some light?