August 9, 2014 was the first time Officer Darren Wilson had ever fired his gun in the line of duty. The result of that shooting, as we all know, was the death of Michael Brown, a teenager from Ferguson, Missouri. But what has not been known—only fraught with myth and conspiracy—was what really happened on that fateful day last summer. And last night Officer Wilson spoke, through his testimony released by the St. Louis County Prosecutor’s Office, presumably in an effort to show those with critical thinking skills that there was never enough evidence to charge Wilson with anything. (Warning: Graphic Language)

Wilson explains to the grand jury that he first saw Michael Brown and his friend, Dorian Johnson, walking down the middle of the street.

“As he [Brown] came around to the mirror I said, ‘Well, what’s wrong with the sidewalk?’ Brown then replied…‘Fuck what you have to say.’”

Officer Wilson then sees the stolen Cigarillos and realizes these are the young men who had just robbed a local convenience store and positions his vehicle to try to cut them off. He opens the door of his cruiser and calls the boys over.

 “As I’m opening the door he turns, faces me, looks at me and says, ‘What the fuck are you going to do about it”, and shuts my door, slammed it shut. I haven’t even got it open enough to get my leg out, it was only a few inches.”

Then, after punching Officer Wilson in the face, and just as has been reported in reputable news sources—but repeatedly ignored by those with a personal agenda—Brown tries to grab Officer Wilson’s gun.

“I said, ‘Get back or I’m going to shoot you.’ He immediately grabs my gun and says, ‘You are too much of a pussy to shoot me.’”

But Officer Wilson was able to grab it back, and two rounds were discharged inside the police cruiser. Brown turns and runs, with Wilson chasing him. The next part of his testimony is the most chilling.

“I tell him to get on the ground… He turns, and when he looked at me, he made like a grunting, like aggravated sound and he starts, he turns and he’s coming back towards me. His first step is coming towards me, he kind of does like a stutter step to start running. When he does that, his left hand goes in a fist and goes to his side, his right one goes under his shirt in his waistband and he starts running at me.”

Wilson fired at Brown several times, but Brown did not retreat, or surrender.

“It looked like he was almost bulking up to run through the shots, like it was making him mad that I’m shooting at him,” he said.

Wilson added that he kept shooting until “the aggression was gone” in Brown’s face, until he felt confident that “the threat was stopped.”

When asked why he didn’t wait for backup, Wilson testified:

“I thought I would be able to just stall until someone got there… I wanted to be out of the car, that way if I need to run I can run.”

You can read the entire compelling transcript here. It is well worth your time.

So there you have it. The myth that Michael Brown was an innocent, “gentle giant” who had his hands in the air, surrendering, and was then cold-bloodedly murdered by a racist cop is just that: A myth. It never happened. And the grand jury had the courage to make the right decision, even under intense pressure to do otherwise. And that is how justice is supposed to work. For all of us.

The death of Michael Brown was needless. And so is the ensuing chaos now engulfing the city of Ferguson, and the seeds of divisiveness growing throughout our nation sown by those with an agenda, whose silence this morning is deafening. And revealing. I’d submit that had Michael Brown cooperated with Officer Wilson, he’d be alive today, and the good people of Ferguson would not have had their businesses destroyed by opportunists, and their lives disrupted based on a lie. So the lesson is this, and it’s a stark one: When confronted by a peace officer, do as he or she asks. Without complaint. And you won’t get shot.