Governor responds to questions about Ferguson during Cape visit

During a visit to Cape Girardeau on Wednesday, Gov. Jay Nixon was faced with questions about the events in Ferguson, Missouri, after the grand jury's Nov. 24 decision not to indict a white police officer in the shooting death of an unarmed black teenager.

Local and national media personnel asked Nixon about the National Guard's presence and role in Ferguson the night of the grand jury's announcement and related riot activity during a question-and-answer session.

Nixon responded:

"Our plan was to have, and we did have, over 700 guardsmen out that night, guarding locations all throughout the region. We wanted to have the local police -- St. Louis County and St. Louis City -- and others, to patrol on the front lines who had been engaging directly with many of those folks throughout the summer. We thought that was better than bringing in the National Guard in full military garb straight onto those streets. Obviously Monday night, we were somewhat surprised by the ... riots, not helped by the number of folks trying to whip that up at various times. As the night went on, we did bring in additional guardsmen into the police department there to back up the folks who were there, and ended up getting out their response teams in the area."

Nixon continued:

"Really, the choice that night was whether we're going to lose lives or lose property. When you have that many hundreds of people shooting guns and running throughout the area and looting, I think it was important to preserve life, and I think all of the unified commanders, as well as the guard's folks, did a great job of that. We didn't have a single shot fired by a single law enforcement officer, and we had hundreds of shots fired out. We didn't have a single shot fired by a national guardsman, and we had none of them significantly injured. So while it was a difficult thing to watch, and challenging, in many ways, I think that when we look back at this, having those law enforcement officers out first, having the guard there behind them, was in fact the best way to do it."

eragan@semissourian.com

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