Thousands Attend Funeral For Unarmed Black Teen Fatally Shot By Ferguson Police By Fatima Sesay

Thousands of family members, community and political allies congregated at a somber funeral ceremony for Michael Brown on Monday, August 25, at the Friendly Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Missouri.Brown, 18, was shot six times by a white police officer, Darren Wilson, on August 9 in his hometown Ferguson, Missouri. Large pictures of Brown were mounted at the front of the church, and mourners dressed in Black with buttons displaying Brown’s picture were brought to their feet by hymns from the Missouri Jurisdictional Choir. Scriptures recited from the Bible, along with readings from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. punctuated the funeral service highlighting several important cases in black history. The death of Brown at the hand of police has sparked intense rioting and protests not only in Ferguson, but many other US states as citizens and groups display their solidarity with the suffering of Brown’s family.

Missouri governor Jay Nixon, who had previously ordered National Guard troops into the city at the of height of the protests, had previously indicated that he would not attend the funeral.Some foreign governments including Egypt, China and Iran have seized upon Brown’s killing to highlight the hypocritical nature of the United States in criticizing the human rights record of other nations.“The Ferguson incident once again demonstrates that even in a country that has for years tried to play the role of an international human rights judge and defender, there is still much room for improvement at home,” stated the New China News Agency in a commentary. “Obviously, what the United States needs to do is to concentrate on solving its own problems rather than always pointing fingers at others.”Benjamin Crump, the lawyer representing the Brown family, shared his sentiments on the “three-fifths human” constitutional declaration of voting for Blacks saying that Brown, who was bound for college in the fall, “was not three-fifths of a citizen. He was an American citizen and we will not accept three-fifths justice.”

On the day preceding the funeral service, Browns father had publicly asked for protesting to stop for a day of quiet and peace during his funeral.“I would like for no protesting,” said Michael Brown Sr. to a St. Louis radio station. “We just want a moment of silence that whole day. Just out of respect for our son.”Among the mourners were movie director Spike Lee, Bishop T.D Jakes, Rev. Jesse Jackson, children of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and California Representative Maxine Waters.
White House officials including Broderick Johnson from the Office of Public Engagement, and chairman of President Obama’s My Brother’s Keeper Task Force, attended the funeral.
At the funeral service, family members recanted their memories of Brown. Brown’s step mother, Cal Brown, said that the slain youth had described a dream to her in which he saw bloody sheets hanging on a clothes line, weeks before his killing. “He pretty much prophesied his own death and he didn’t even realize it,” she said.

She also called him “an awesome man” who wished for a family, and the chance to be a "good father". The Reverend Al Sharpton delivered Brown’s eulogy, in which he condemned inequality and the militarized police displays during the Ferguson protests.“This is about fairness, and America is going to have to come to terms with it,” Sharpton said. “There’s something wrong when we have money to give military equipment to police forces, but we don’t have money for public education and money to train our children.

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