Current status Retired (resigned) Years of service 2009–2014 Role Police officer Siblings Jared Harris, Kara Sosko | Country United States Name Darren Wilson Parents Tonya Durso, John Wilson | |
Born May 14, 1986 (age 38) ( 1986-05-14 ) Fort Worth, Texas Alma mater Eastern Missouri Police Academy Department Jennings Police Department, Ferguson Police Department Spouse Barbara Spradling (m. 2014), Ashley Brown (m. 2011–2013) People also search for Tonya Durso, Barbara Spradling, John Blumenthal | ||
Darren Dean Wilson (born May 14, 1986) is an American former police officer. He is known for shooting and killing Michael Brown, an 18-year-old unarmed African American man, on August 9, 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri. He has been exonerated of criminal wrongdoing twice with respect to his shooting of Brown. The first occurrence came in November 2014, when a grand jury chose not to indict him. The second came in March 2015, when the United States Department of Justice released a report concluding that Wilson's use of force against Brown was defensible, and also cleared Wilson of having violated Brown's civil rights.
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Early life
Wilson was born in Texas in 1986 to Tonya and John Wilson. His parents divorced in 1989, when he was either two or three years old. Wilson attended St. Charles West High School; in November 2002, while he was a student there, his mother died of natural causes. Wilson graduated from high school in 2004.
Police career
Wilson's first police job was as a rookie officer in Jennings, Missouri, where he began working in 2009. With respect to this job, Wilson said to the New Yorker in 2015 that “I’d never been in an area where there was that much poverty." The police force in Jennings was shut down by the town's city council in March 2011.
Career in Ferguson
In October 2011, Wilson began working for the Ferguson Police Department. In February 2013, Wilson won a commendation from the Ferguson Police Department after he subdued a suspect who was later charged with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute and resisting arrest.
Shooting of Michael Brown
On August 9, 2014, Wilson shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, which sparked considerable unrest in the town, as well as protests nationwide. Wilson was named as the officer who killed Brown on August 15. In March 2015, a report by the Justice Department corroborated Wilson's claims that Brown reached into Wilson's car and struck Wilson. Wilson has said that this shooting made him "unemployable" and that he was turned down from a Ferguson Police Department job after being cleared by a grand jury.
On the anniversary of the incident, August 9, 2015, the Columbia (Missouri) Police Officers' Association proclaimed "Darren Wilson Day", calling Wilson an "innocent, but persecuted, officer" and insisted that his ethnicity had nothing to do with their support of him. An ABC affiliate reported that the post was shared nearly 60 times on the site before being removed. The CPOA then put up another post where it stated its support for Wilson and "all law enforcement officers who endure similar situations."
That same day, there was a protest in Ferguson, during which protestors carried a roasted pig, wearing a police officer hat, with the name "Darren Wilson" scrawled on the side of it. After the group reached a police department, the pig was placed on a concrete barrier around the building and the protestors carved and ate from its head.
Personal life
Wilson married Ashley Brown on October 15, 2011. Wilson filed for divorce from Brown in 2012, and their divorce was finalized on November 18, 2013. After he began working as a police officer in Ferguson, he was mentored by Barbara Spradling, who later became his girlfriend, and who he lived with as of the weeks following his shooting of Michael Brown. In November 2014, Wilson married Spradling; their daughter was born in March 2015. Wilson also has two stepsons.