Further reading on Ferguson and legal change

I confess that I am not as bullish about the process or outcome of the grand jury investigation as some, but I have little to add directly on that point. (Here are the grand jury materials for those who want to dig in.) Instead I wanted to pass along a few links to related posts that I thought advanced the conversation in different directions.

– The Bloomberg editorial staff argues that it's a bad idea to require police to wear body cameras. This retreads some of the points I confronted in my post about the right to record the police, though I still think that recording should be allowed even if it is not required.

– My friend Eric Citron has a post at SCOTUSBlog putting the grand jury process in the context of a 1992 Supreme Court decision, Williams, which held that there is no obligation to present potentially exculpatory evidence to the grand jury.

– I haven't seen a good piece yet about what to expect in a civil suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 against Officer Wilson. If that suit gets the same amount of public attention as the grand jury procedure has, it could be an opportunity for a public debate about the doctrine of qualified immunity, and whether it is necessary or unjustified. (Joanna Schwartz's important new article on police indemnification is relevant here too.)