Was CNN’s Michael Brown Shooting Audio Fake?
Ferguson, Missouri has been the site of protests over the shooting of Michael Brown for nearly a month now, with new details about the case becoming headline news every day. An alleged audio file of Brown’s shooting was a hot item once CNN broke its release a few days ago, but now even the network itself is doubting the shooting audio, according to CNN’s recent coverage of the tape.
Former LAPD police officer and author David Klinger expressed his skepticism about the audio on Wednesday’s program.
“For all I know this is what one of Howard Stern’s punk people have been doing. It came out, what, two weeks after the event. I don’t have a high level of confidence, but it could be.”
Even CNN’s own law enforcement analyst Tom Fuentes was not confident about the Brown shooting audio. Furthermore, he noted that even if the tape is authentic, it serves both sides of the story.
“Well, the engineers in the laboratory will be trying to determine if there was a dubbing, do we have an original recording of this guy having a conversation that no one wants to talk about, then the shots are dubbed over it. Is it the complete tape? All of the accounts, from Brown’s shot and officers shot, say there was a single shot fired initially at the door of the police car. That shot, followed by Brown trying to flee and then pursuing him and then firing the series of shots. I don’t know, we’re missing that first shot. CNN got this tape first. Did they censor it because the guy said something obscene?”
Critical media were quick to jump on CNN’s faltering confidence in Michael’s supposed shooting tape. Conservative news source Breitbart published an editorial tearing down CNN for its decision to release the dubious tape.
“Even if the audio ends up being authentic, the fact that CNN is now concerned over its authenticity and laying the groundwork to claim they were always skeptical, tells you how irresponsible the network is. The prejudicial audio never should have been aired prior to authentication. But this is exactly the kind of incendiary behavior we have come to expect from the news network that disgraced itself more than any other during the George Zimmerman affair.“
Breitbert is referring to CNN’s release of a 911 call in which George Zimmerman supposedly called Trayvon Martin a “f**king coon” before proceeding to shoot him. Although the tape’s dubious nature didn’t look good for CNN, it was far from the worst error from mainstream media during the Zimmerman affair. MSNBC edited a tape of the 911 call to make it appear that Zimmerman had responded “He looks black” out of the blue to the operator, cutting out the portion of the tape where he was asked about the ethnicity of Martin.
