Multiple dead after car ploughs through parade in Wisconsin

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Did anyone die?

I wasn't talking about her *intentions*.

Nobody died, but as she ploughed into the protesters I'm 100% sure she suspected she terminated a few (sheer luck she didn't).

Oh, OK, but no one died, hence, no murder charge.

She was still facing 15 years behind bars. The plea deal might be to get her to plead guilty and avoid a lengthy court hearing and spend a couple of years behind bars. Instead she knocked it back.

Her case appears to have dragged on already for exactly 12 months already given the incident happend on Dec 11 2020

15 years is way too lenient….if she’s found guilty.

If she’s guilty, she’s fortunate she didn’t kill anybody.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/02/11/1080176962/darrell-brooks-christmas-parade-waukesha-plea

During the preliminary hearing, police detective Thomas Casey testified that he and other officers yelled at Brooks to stop as he drove the SUV through the parade in downtown Waukesha on Nov. 21.

He described how the vehicle zigzagged across the street for blocks, smashing into marchers from behind and running them over. He said Brooks injured 61 people, including the six people he killed.

So the defense is claiming Brooks was trying to avoid the police and didn't mean to kill the marchers. The cops/prosecutors are painting a picture that Brooks intended to kill/take out as many marchers as he could by zig-zagging.

I wonder if there were CCTV or video cameras to verify the police account? Given police in the US are in the habit of lying to courts to stitch up their targets or to avoid incriminating themselves I would be more comfortable with extra evidence than relying on police testimony alone.

It's become very difficult for these lying cops as most have cameras attached to 'em. Injuring 60 people is a lot of zig-zagging as I assume some ran or were running.

In addition to cameras, I also think eye witness testimony is crucial. But again the concern I have is that witnesses are forced to undergo police questioning and cops tend to close ranks and put pressure on witnesses to follow a particular narrative the witnesses might be subject to interference from the coppers.

Video camera footage is probably needed to close the loop

There was plenty of footage uploaded at the time (doubtless some small amount is already in this thread (either video or links to it), but I haven't checked), but to help you out:

Interestingly, it looks like the driver had a street they could have attempted to turn off at before the main section of the parade had they not been moving so fast.
or:

Around 2:00 there is a section of video shot by the person being interviewed where the vehicle changes direction to head towards the footpath... Here is a still image from it:


As you can see in this image, he isn't going in a straight line (likely the reason for the "zig zag" claim - I'm not sure how many other times such an event occurred) - I don't know if he hit any of the people on the road-side, or if he straightened up and only hit the people on that side of the band near the footpath trying to minimise how many people he drove into compared to the 2 rows he may have otherwise hit.

The problem for him will be connected to the barriers he drove through (at speed), and the fact that he didn't slow down, or make any effort to turn onto a side road, when he saw what was in front of him, instead proceeding at speed into (and through) the parade from behind.

Yes this picture together with the act of driving into people seems incriminating for Brooks. I can't see how he (Brooks) can escape culpability.

I initially thought the police claim of Brooks "zig zagging" sounded melodramatic to make it appear Brook's intent was planned to take out those marching. Call me suspicious but police have (in the past) been held responsible for instigating car chases resulting in pedestrian or innocent driver deaths.

A reasonable person would have hit the brakes rather than kills what look children. So either way Brooks is going down. I am, however, curious whether there was an initial police chase and whether the police pursued Brooks knowing he was heading toward a crowd and whether the correct thing to do was to pull back rather than continue pursuing the suspect (Brooks).

According to reports from the time, an officer had made contact with the vehicle when he went through the barriers to enter where the parade was occurring, and an officer fired a shot to try and stop him at that time, but that was the only police interaction he had. Not being involved in a chase, and driving through barriers\police blocking a road won't help his cause (The first video I had in the post you replied to gives an idea of the speed he was going while inside the blocked-off area for the parade, and doesn't show anyone being hit) before he hit anyone.

For reference, the footage in that first video appears to be taken from somewhere towards the middle of where the parade started and the marker indicating where people were hit, and there were many side-roads where he could have attempted to exit through rather than pushing forward through the parade (both before and after he first hit anyone):

I thought Brooks was fleeing a domestic disturbance?
https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-amer ... 59b7k.html

That initial part of the events isn't really that crystal clear in the whole police report?

He may have been doing so (I seem to recall that being mentioned around the time), but that doesn't automatically imply there was any pursuit.

He may have simply been fleeing from the location of the disturbance, but police had yet to arrive at the scene, take statements thee, or put out a call to look out for a vehicle such as he was driving, as I don't remember any mention of his being pursued at the time (I don't believe any media at the time suggested he was being pursued).

Even were he to be in the process of being pursued, it doesn't explain why he didn't try to get off the road that was blocked by the parade (rather than driving through it) and onto a clear section of road where he would be able to travel at a faster speed.

Is it possible the police are downplaying the initial chase to create a narrative that Brook's intent all along was really to kill innocent people?

There is a possibility this is a police chase gone wrong and Brooks finding himself in a bind being blocked by a parade decided (on the spur of the moment) to plough through them.

Either way Brooks is going to jail for a long time (death penalty?). But his actual intent and the motivation of the cops is still a little murky.