Ferguson Mayor: Governor Refused National Guard Deployment Amid Unrest

The mayor of Ferguson said Wednesday that he had tried in vain to urge Gov. Jay Nixon to deploy the National Guard in his town as people burned and looted buildings in protest of a grand jury’s decision in the Michael Brown case.

Mayor James Knowles III was the lead witness as a Missouri legislative committee began hearing testimony on why the National Guard was not quickly deployed in Ferguson on Nov. 24, when grand jurors opted not to charge officer Darren Wilson, who is white, for fatally shooting the black 18-year-old.

Nixon declared a state of emergency a week before the grand jury decision and had said the National Guard would be available to help local authorities “protect life and property” in case protests turned violent, as they did after Brown was shot Aug. 9

On Wednesday, some senators asked Knowles if he was ever told that the National Guard was withheld from Ferguson as retribution for Jackson not stepping down. Knowles said he was not, adding that he hadn’t spoken with Nixon since early September.

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Associated Press reporter Summer Ballentine contributed to this report. Follow David A. Lieb at: https://twitter.com/DavidALieb

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