are protestors blocking the street and standing in the street. in some cases, the cars have nowhere to go. so police right now are making an announcement to move -- what the -- >> i'm running. one moment. >> are you okay? >> yes, i'm okay. what sounded like gunshots. >> don't worry about us. if you need to run or duck or do anything, please do. don't even think about it. >> i can stay on the phone. what i heard was gunshots. and again, going back to what we were talking about earlier -- while i hear gunshots -- cars are still blocked, there's nowhere to go if you're in a car. i'm walking away from the police. i can still keep going away from them. >> what are those people doing? are they panicking? we are seeing cars moving. i can't imagine being stuck in the middle of something like

this with nowhere to go. are people getting out of their cars and trying to find safety otherwise or are they staying in their cars? >> people are staying in their cars. the cars are moving. even with moving you're not getting away. so you're moving maybe -- slow traffic, like rush hour traffic. you're slowly going where you need to go, but you're still not far enough from the gunshots -- you're not far enough from the tear gas to really say you're getting away. >> and you are now -- you are now down where that traffic is or are you further up towards the mcdonald's is? >> the mcdonald's is where the media staging area is is. people are running right now. >> can you tell -- okay. all right. let's -- let's let her do exactly what she needs to do and hopefully she is staying safe. let's go to amanda out there as

well. >> there are gunshots from the other direction, but the cops are advancing. i think i got hit by a -- >> what was that? are you okay? >> yes. running from the crowd. >> did you say you got hit by a pellet? >> i don't know. i was hit by something. it was just a light. i don't know. the crowd is definitely disbursing now. there's kind of nowhere for the people to go, though. there were definitely -- i heard at least ten gunshots, five in one direction, five in another. right now, the crowds are kind of dying down. >> we just saw a large line of police officers in what looked

like to be an empty parking lot. there they are right now. i'm not sure what they're doing. the parking lot, other than the police, looks rather empty. do you see a different kind of tactic now as far as the police activity goes, amanda? >> i'm too far away to see the police. i'm behind the crowd now. and i can see there's still maybe 50 in the front line still holding rank. but the people who were -- appeared to be just observing -- >> amanda, i want you to focus on keeping yourself safe. we'll check back in with you in a little while. but don't put yourself in danger, okay? let's go to jim kav gnaw and former atf agent, he is watch thg along with us. jim, thanks for coming back to

us now. tell us what you're seeing right now. >> i thought they fired some stink balls. >> what's that? >> it's like a small rubber projectile that bursts out. it's trying to disburse the crowd. it's called a sting ball. there's also pepper gas. you kind of see those things burst out. they're trying to run the crowd back. you can also see some on the feed we were watching, it looked like they made an arrest or two right in front of those white vans which look like transport vans that moved up. so i think they've probably made a couple of arrests. then they advanced the line quickly down, like amanda said. she gave us a great picture from behind the crowd. so she's behind the crowd, therefore, you know, she felt maybe the sting ball. hopefully that's all it was for her. she's given us a picture for

clear of 50 hard core demonstrators that are fighting and defying the police order and throwing back the tear gas and maybe other projectiles. the reports of the gunshots and -- she said from demonstrators side and maybe police said. if demonstrators fired on the police line, then, you know, those tactical officers would pick that gunfire up quickly from the flash and they would return that fire. so, you know, they -- you see them perched on top of those bear cat vehicles. they're going to fire back with a rifle. so you could have had an exchange of gunfire. but you did have a couple of arrest. looks like they're down to maybe 50 according to amanda's report. a lot of other people have disbursed. your good observation about that police line that looked peaceful

is probably a flanking line on one of the side streets from the main line, so they can turn the demonstrators one way or the other. they may not want them to run around behind the police line or go a certain direction. so they have a flanking line or a line protecting the gear. so they would travel maybe another way. >> we want to go to chris hayes in ferguson been doing a lot of shows. you are on the scene right now, right? >> yeah, i am. >> we are hearing some people were just stuck in the middle of this sitting in their cars trying to move. it looks like they're moving. is that what you're seeing? >> the access here was extremely restricted. we're now watching officers walking next to what looks like a large tactical vehicle as it

rolls down the avenue accompanied by that sort of now familiar high-pitched crowd control buzzing noise. there are choppers overhead. you can see the kind of debris in the streets which has -- which really does look like -- people have ripped up blocks it looks like, chunks of concrete on the ground. these were used by police officers to stop vehicles from approached. it's kind of unclear as of now which it was. >> what kind of affect is it having on the crowd right now? >> it's very hard to see the crowd which is behind this huge line. there's a confrontation happening right now as i speak between about six or seven police officers down a side street and a man standing in a blue shirt and white shorts. looks like possibly in his yard or the sidewalk. he's lit up by their lights. they've got him in their lights.

they're barking at him over the public address system to go home. and there's a big -- i'm looking at another big tactical vehicle with gentlemen in gas masks getting you've that as well coming down. there now seems to be a kind of final standoff here as these officers all sort of file in behind the tactical vehicles they have. it's hard to make out many protestors left on the street, but you can feel the tear gas in the air burning your eyes right now. hold on one second. i'm on the -- there's quite -- quite -- there's quite a scene here. >> we can tell. we're a little far back as far as our camera angle, but it still looks like a lot of people out there. >> there's a small dumpster fire

at the qt and chunks of concrete in the road. and doesn't -- it's hard to make out the size of the crowd down the street from here. >> have you seen any sign -- you said there's a dumpster fire. i know that looting had been a problem. >> they are now -- i know -- i know. there are now tactical officers approaching behind their vehicles in full riot gear with gas masks and fields and some of the more heavily militarized gear we've seen before. there's a -- what looks like a swat team outside the qt near a dumpster fire outside what has become the infamous gas station. where people had rumored that he had been accused of --

>> get behind us! >> getting barked at by the cops not to pass them. >> can you hold your phone up? >> he just said to me on air, media do not pass us, you're getting maced next time you pass us. >> they're threatening to mace you? >> yes. the tear gas is pretty thick. >> why are they threatening you? >> because they're generally hopped up and angry and pissed off and about excited that there's about 15 reporters watching what they're doing, i would manuaimagine. >> i'm trying to tell if they're changing their tactics. we've seen police move off in different directions. it looked like some people were being detained. positive pli arrested. we just saw a large police vehicle driving off scene.

i can't really tell if that's a vehicle they would take possible suspects away in. have you witnessed arrestarrest? >> not right now. that i have created such a security in here. there seems to be a stand off happening right now with a small unit near the dumpster. they appear to be looking for a suspect. we're now being pushed back by the police in riot gear. they're pushing back the press perimeter, pushing us -- >> chris, i'm curious -- go ahead. sorry. given the fact -- >> cops here definitely being in no uncertain terms pushing people back. >> how long have you been out there? the reason why i ask, we're still almost two hours away -- >> there is no one on the street. no one anywhere on the street.

it's -- [ inaudible ] five minutes from now, five minutes, i'm getting hollered at i78 going to get arrested if i go the wrong way. the -- you know, basically you can go -- it's so surreal. half a mile from here, it's just quiet, dead, suburban streets. there's no one out. it's completely dead quiet except for the police chopper overhead. so, yeah -- >> we've been hearing reports of shots fired. and it's my understanding that even though it was long prior to the midnight curfew, that the situation among demonstrators escalated. but what do you know about why this escalated the way it did today with shots being fired and a person possibly being injured and how is this different than

other nights? >> so this is a -- pretty close to basically pretty close to that thursday night which was the infamous night in which officers -- in which reporters were arrested and led to the massive response the next day. releasing the ferguson police of command. you have to understand the wave. the first night, the qt was burned. then they come out with very, very heavy police presence, tactical gear, swat teams, vehicles pointing weapons at nonviolent protestors, pushing back the line. then of course there was the change on thursday with ron johnson, this celebratory atmosphere. i was doing my show only a few hours earlier than this. i'm -- i'm now standing right there, it sort of looks like a burnt out ruin. but that atmosphere was sort of

joyful. it -- there was looting of various stores. i'm looking at one right now just a few money yards from the qt. that i think was -- that and the images from the local media, you have to understand the way it's being perceived here, this is a place where law and order and politics run deep. they have gotten themselves elected on law and order. images of broken windows. and so they've decided that they're not going to tolerate, they're going to bring the boot down. in terms of the actual event that precipitated -- whole bunch of squad cars going up right now. tonight's response, i have seen the same reports, but i have seen no independent verification from the reporters. i have seen no reporters saying

there were eyewitnesss to molotov cocktails or shots being fired. in previous nights, now a number of officers getting out with large assault weapons, baton, light gear, about three squad cars pulling up. >> that's what you're seeing right now? >> yes, that's what we're seeing right now. we have -- we are trying to stream this. we'll see if we can get it into the control room for you. we've got some kind of standoff down the road. but they've pushed us back to far, it's hard to see exactly what is happening. what led to the tear gas tonight, that's unclear. in a broader sense of what strategic posture of the police have been, there was clearly a shift. there was a shift away from that towards a community police model, sort of festival

celebration here. then i think after the looting that had happened friday night, which i should note from everyone on the ground was a very tiny number of people, often stopped or interrupted by protestors. there's a lot of outrage and frustration with the looting here locally. in the wake of that, a much more aggressive posture in the last two nights. last night and again tonight. last night, the standoff was about the actual curfew deadline. there was 140, 150 people according to reports who did not want to back down. >> do you get the sense, chris, that this crowd has been described as mostly very young people, mostly young men. is it your sense that there is any kind of an organization to them? is there a leader? is there some kind of hierarchy or is it just chaos? >> i can't answer that because i don't see the people right now that are in question.

i think when i was here on previous nights, it was a combination of organization -- i mean you're talking about hundreds and thousands of people in the community coming through at different times. you do have some leaders. you have a professor that's been doing organizing that we've spoke to. you have some youth ministers and so forth. and of course antonio french. he's been trying to exercise a lot of kind of community control and discipline. he's been tweeting and having conversations with protestors. his opinion was to respect the curfew last night. we're talking about thousands of people, 22,000 people that live in ferguson -- >> we spoke with him a little earlier, and he said exactly what you just described. he was kind of voicing his disappointment that there weren't enough grownups in the crowd to really organize the young people. my sense of what he was saying

is obviously counterproductive to what they are out there demonstrating during the day over. >> yes. obviously there's a lot of folks out here and a lot of frustration. people coming from all different places on the political spectrum. all different places in terms of their feeling about law enforcement. no one -- it's not a sort of organization where anyone's electing a leader or anything. it's people in the street. some people in the street want calm and justice and a small number of people in the street i think want mashed up and some people in the street want confrontations with police whether they're nonviolent or staring them down or other things. but again, the thing to remember here is if you've got a thousand people and -- and it takes one of those to throw a bottle at --

which was allegedly the precipitating event thursday night. there's a thousand people or 150 people. it takes one person to throw a bottle to get the kind of really intense response we're seeing. there's got to be some way to police this situation that is neither -- you know, that is neither chaos nor the picture that we're seeing now. >> we're going to let you go. i know you need to gather more information. thank you for spending so much time with us. let's go to mark potter. i know you're out there on the scene. i'm not sure if you're on the phone or camera. can you hear me? >> yes, i can hear you. i'm off camera because of a satellite delay. did you see the scene with the officers in line here? >> yes, we can. >> this is a group of officers that are standing in a line in a shopping center parking lot. that line is serving as a

command center for the police agencies that are here. about an hour a half ago, there was report of shooting down in the protest zone. then there was a concern, a big concern here that there might have been people behind this shopping center. they said they had a report of someone throwing a molotov cocktail. we cannot confirm that, but that's what they heard. they came running over here to guard this parking lot behind them is the command center. they're facing to the south. and there's a tree line over there. they had told us there was a group of people behind the shopping center. they fired tear gas over there to try to disburse them. they flew a helicopter overhead. and just a short while ago, everybody seemed to relax. the order came to take off their masks, just to standby. the indication was that there was -- it was a clear scene in the street and no real problems

behind the stores anymore. of course, this is a major shopping center, target store, footlocker, grocery store, things like that. obviously there's concern about the businesses, but also the command center itself. nothing really did happen on this side of the building. but they told us that there was some activity, some people that had gathered behind the building and they were getting them out. in the meantime, all of these officers lined up, they had their masks on, there was a moment of tension there. that's the kind of night we're having tonight. activity stop and go right now we're in a slack period and waiting to see what happens. >> is it your sense, mark, that the crowd has dissipated and when they do break up, because of this kind of police action, do they just regroup somewhere else? >> it's hard for me to say because to be honest i'm about a half mile away from the protest zone. it's down the road.

and i can't see that. we don't have any of those crowds here. again, we're sort of downstream from them at the command center where the officers have set up behind -- slightly away from the area where the most activity has been over the last few nights. but even that far away, there was the concern that developed tonight and that brought all these officers out here from a number of different departments. we've seen officers coming in from state highway patrol, county, the city, but also from st. louis itself and other departments here. they are standing by should something else develop. right now, they seem to be in a stand down mode. the helicopter is still circling, but it doesn't have its light on, at least not in this area. whatever the threat was originally, has gone away at least for now and everybody's in a more relaxed mode. >> we're looking --

>> they're a little more relaxed. >> we're looking at pictures of the street littered with the tear gas canisters. they sent countless tear gas canisters towards the crowd. it appears to have broken up quite a bit in the past hour or so. since we were in the thick of it. speaking of being in the thick of it, mark, you have to think this happened so long before the curfew. so many people much still been out and about. have you seen just regular innocent people being caught up in all this? >> no, they haven't been. where i am. the reason for that is, many of the roads surrounding this area coming off the highway for miles each way have been -- are being shut down. they're being monday titored. people that might want to come in here, their cars are not even able to. there is nobody in the parking lot that would be shopping. it's all been shut down.

the road that's right in front of me now, the order has been given, you come up to these houses and that's as far as you go unless you're a police officer yourself. so there's nobody here outside law enforcement and news people because they are just very dedicated to keeping everyone away. they've shut down roads all the way to the highway from here. so most people aren't getting in here. the radio traffic is down considerably. that's the other thing. >> okay. >> there's a command right now, bear with me a second. i can't really hear. earlier he was the one that came and told everyone to take their masks off. i've seen some of the officers from other places actually walking over to the command center. if we could spin to the left just a little bit. you'll see a sign down there that says emergency vehicles only. beyond that, that's where the command center is. people staging, the ones for the

next wave should they be needed, they're there. that joust just shows you the areas we're talking about. stood down, so we'll see what happens. we hear banks every so often. we can't really tell what they are. we did have a new waves of tear gas. we felt it. but that has since gone away. >> nbc's mark potter live in ferguson, missouri for us. we also want to go to goldie taylor. this all comes hours after this rally was held there, you know, the reverend al stamp sharpton spoke. there was a real call for peace. this was just hours ago. and then this. >> you know, i think that community leaders are grasping at whatever piece of peace that they can have. one church service two or three hours long won't serve the decades of tension that have

been arising in st. louis county. the fact of the matter is the gee yoe political framework in around my home city, 90 jurisdictions, one county is blowing follow-up in their face tonight. they don't have experience in crowd control of this magnitude. you know, on the other hand, you don't have a communities that is -- has any depth of the experience in collective action. what you do have is pure chaos on the ground. what i'm told tonight from friends and family on the ground is that this started with a very peaceful impromptu party at that quiktrip. that they were barbecuing, that they weren't being violent tonight. that somehow police posture changed. i think that by morning, we're going to have time to step back and unravel this all and understand what the general course of events are tonight. i'll tell you what is at the root of this. there has never been a line of

communication or trust between law enforcement and this community. and having one man, no less he may be, captain johnson, stand up on behalf of these police departments and offer his hand frankly isn't enough. they understand it isn't captain johnson controlling their streets every day. it's an officer that doesn't live among them. an officer they don't believe values their walk of life. we're going to continue seeing this kind of thing until people really understand or can see tangible transparency in this investigation. i think they are going to be calling for a number of things in the morning, including a special prosecutor and the removal of the state prosecutor from this case. he has a history and it's clear. and people are talking about it openly for the very first time. i hope that there will be at

least clarity tonight. >> we've had more than one person on the ground there explain to us it was all fine until shots were fired and apparently somebody got hurt. whoever it was that fired those shots, that is what caused the escalation that we're seeing the tail end of right now. you touched on a number of things. first and foremost is the relationship between this community and law enforcement. we've heard more than one person say, you know, this goes back decades, which is this distrust between mostly african-american community and mostly white police force, right? >> that's right. absolutely, it does. >> can you just walk us through -- for all of us who have never been to ferguson, missouri before, can you explain the history of why there is such a combative relationship? the crowd is mostly disbursed. as antonio french was saying

earlier, we've got a lot of young men out there who are very, very angry and distrustful. can you walk us through that history for us please? >> you know, as i was coming to growth, i understood that cities like ferguson and saint anne were all white. these were all white sundown towns. and that african-americans in st. louis could only live in certain areas. those areas like housing, those areas like meaningful jobs at meaningful wages. so we were trapped in areas where we could not make meaningful lives for ourself. an economical par tied, if you were. you can't live and work and play in my community after sundown, but you can come clean my home in the daytime. you can have those kinds of

marginal jobs that you really can't feed your family on. as civil rights took foot and we were able to move into other neighbors and we were able to come to places like ferguson and make a way of life for ourselves, some whites decided that they wanted to push even further into the outlying county area. saint charles county, which was all farmland really when i was growing up. now you've got a shift in who lives in some of these close-in neighborhoods like ferguson. you've got a population now 67% african-american. certainly wasn't true when i was coming up. the power shift has not changed. >> i'm curious, though. i don't mean to interrupt you. i want to ask you this following question while you're saying what you're saying. why, considering the fact that this is as you said predominantly african-american population, how do you explain a

police force of 53 officers that all but three of them are white? >> well, you know, you got to look at the structure of ferguson. it is a city manager structure. that's who hires the police chief. the police chief then decides to hire his officers. those officers are 53 strong, only three of them african-american. they're accountable to a city council. one of them is right. brought in after an election over the last cycle. so you have a group of people who don't really understand that a police force most effective reflects and is drawn from the community by which it serves. what they've done however is begin to recruit, you know, officers on maybe a dichbt set of criteria. maybe simply on, you know, training alone. you need training and connection. that's important. i think there are some communities that require a police officers that live in the community where they seven.

i'm for that. but you don't have that kind of thing in ferguson. this particular officer involved in the initial incident lived in chesterfield. chesterfield is 97% white. so that's the kind of disconnection that you got here on the ground. i will hear them tell you all the time that they are unable -- unable to recruit african-american or nonwhite candidates to their forces and that it's pay and compensation. pay and compensation are more than a paycheck. it's the environment that i believe i will have to work in. it's the command for which i believe i'll have to work. so they're applying for other positions in other areas because they don't trust the command in a place like ferguson. >> people are calling for change. maybe that's some of the change that we'll be seeing going forward here in ferguson, missouri. thank you for joining us. if you don't mind staying available, we may be coming back with you.

thank you for that insight. let's go to tremaine. you are nearby. what is your impression of the situation as it stands right now. >> what we're seeing tonight isn't very different than what we've seen the previous nights. the military style, you know, vehicles and the police with the big guns and -- but i think what's critical here is the moment were there is actually a competing interest within this -- this moment. we're not dealing with a cohesive movement at this moment. we have protestors slow and steady and wanting to get to the heart of the investigation around the killing of michael pro brown. the other, everybody has talked about these, these hopeless young people. these are a lot of young people, don't want to be too presumptuous about who is out there, but these are young

people not afraid of violence, they're not afraid necessarily of death. there's not too much hope in their lives. i think that's where some of the speakers in today's rally spoke about how -- we've all failed them. we've taken dreams away from them. that's how they actually feel. we hear about reports of molotov cocktails and guns being fired off at the police. again, at this critical moment, it's been a week since this young man was killed. setoff so much of the protests and anger around what some perceive as the continuation of all the hostility between the police and the community. now you have those on the front lines, we're talking about issues between police and mostly young men. we're not talking about issues between the police and the deacon at the church or your grandmother. we're talking about these young men. that's who we're seeing hungering down.

>> i want to ask you, i want you to continue along with goldie taylor was talking about. she was sort of describing how things were when she was growing up in that area. she was giving us a little bit of background on that history, not only because of young black men there who do not trust law enforcement or authorities at all there, but she was also turboing on other things. for instance, not being able to find meaningful work. tell us about the factors that go into all of this that we're see sfwlg what we're seeing here isn't necessarily isolated. it kind of has a different face because it's a small suburban town. and again, it's all about policy. let's think about how we came to this moment here. we're talking about generations of people living in poverty. in this community, some folks used to call it sundown town, black folks couldn't even be

here when the sun went down. now these major apartment complexes where now they serve primarily low-income residents who are lacking education, lacking jobs. then you talk about being destined in the community, are there boys and girls clubs, are there things in place -- especially the young people. you don't have any of that. we talk about collective trauma a lot. in chicago, we talk about gun violence. our whole community witness the acts of violence. we talk about abstract violence of real amohunger. every single person to some degree or another are feeling this. so you have a whole community, all these young men on the politic together, with nothing else to do. so it all kinds of feeds into that.

this is, you know, a special circumstance. we're not seeing rioting all over the place and police have been killing young black men for a long time. in this circumstance, we're seeing it play out this way. >> thank you very much. let's two to alicia williams on the phone. she describes herself as a protestors. i understand that you were hit by tear gas is that right? >> i definitely was. we was marching up to the command center to go down on our knees to say, hands up, don't shoot, and all of a sudden they start shooting -- >> is your voice hoarse from breathing in tear gas? >> no. it's from -- i was breathing it in, but it was also from shouting, from protesting. >> describe the protest leading up to the police arriving in

such force and firing tear gas. >> it was beautiful. we was marching -- at first everybody was just standing around. so we decided let's march. we'll march up to the command center, go down on our knees and say hand up, don't shoot. and we demand justice. and before we can get down to our knees, they start shooting us with tear gas. i spent ten years in the military. i know what tear gas is. this is not -- nobody blow no cocktails at them, didn't nobody shoot at them. this was peaceful. it was a demonstration. we had kids next to us. all we was doing was marching. that's it. marching. on our civil rights and they just starting shooting at us for no reason. one girl laid in the street and they shot her like four times with it. >> we heard several people say that during this -- this protest

march that you're describing that what led the police to react, and this is from people that we've spoken to tonight, obviously i am not there, we have heard reports of shots being fired and somebody being hurt. did you witness that? >> i'm telling you, i was on the front line. there were no shots fired. wasn't nothing. we marched up there. it was no shots fired. it didn't come from no crowd. didn't nobody throw no cocktails or anything at them. we just marched up there in peace and then got threatened because there was over a thousand black people marching and they couldn't take it. >> where are you now? >> i am down -- i can't even get home to my sister house because i'm trapped back here behind the police. we had to take shelter. i got hit with it in my face. i had to go into mcdonald's.

thank you mcdonald's for giving me milk to get it out of my eyes. you don't get no smoke bomb out you eyes with no milk. that's tear gas. i've been in the military. i know what it is. >> do you feel that the crowd has mostly moved elsewhere at this point? >> they ain't got no choice. they shooting them with rubber bullets. they shooting them with tear gas. what choice do they have but to move. >> all right. ms. williams, a self-described protest tore there in ferguson missouri. feel better. i hope that your voice returns tomorrow and that you feel much better. >> we are covering this live an msnbc as the situation seems to have escalated quite a bit today. we'll be following this breaking news throughout the night. you're watching msnbc. (male announcer) it's happening.

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existed their entire lives. over the years, lock upcrews have discovered family members serving together. >> bog on death row, it was like i needed to be with my assister. >> the identical twins, most convicted of murder were send to the north carolina correctional institution for women. doris got a life sentence. evette was condemned to die. she told us about her first day on death row. >> i began to hear people talk about, oh, she's got sentencing death. she's going to die for the crimes that she committed. even though they were housed at the same prison, the women were prohibited from seeing one another, but occasionally doris

would catch a fleeting glipgs. >> i'd see my sister in the window. i'd talk by with a group of ladies. everybody would say, there's your sister. i wish she was out here, you know. and i hated to go by there just to see her and it hurt my heart. >> after six years of separation, her punishment was reduced to a life sentence, meaning she could leave death row and reunite with doris. >> i was so excited for her. we were crying and kissing and hugging. >> i started crying. i got emotional i just began to praise god. >> though, they can see each other in the yard, prison officials won't let the sisters share a cell for security reasons. >> they think we are the same person in the same dorm, the officers. and they get confused. >> it's interesting and kind of

unusual for corrections because if you're not paying attention, you don't know who you're talking to. that's one of the reasons why we house them separately. >> you look wonderful. look wonderful, sis. >> that's my only brother. we're really close. we're really tight. we eat together, we lift together, we work together. >> our visit to the state penitentiary in iowa, led us to another pair of sin links. >> growing up, i wanted to be him. he's almost four years older than me. i see him running around dri drinking and breaking into some of. that's my big brother. that's my idol. i kind of falled into the same

footsteps. >> those footsteps led down a bloody path that ended at a holiday party in their trailer park. >> it was christmas night 1992. me and my brother went to a party with what we thought were friends, but they tried to rob us. >> they started beating me up. >> they hurt brad. i couldn't let them get away with that. i couldn't handle that. so we left, went to my trailer. i got a shotgun, my brother got a knife. we went back out there and did what he did. >> i remember him standing there and he had -- working away from the regular programming this evening continuing coverage of the unrest in ferguson, missouri. one week and one day after the shooting of michael brown, there is more unrest here on the streets of ferguson, missouri. yesterday, a curfew was imposed for the first time from the hours of 12:00 midnight to 5:00

a.m. tonight, that curfew will be imposed. we are a little over an hour away. earlier we saw some new confrontations with -- with police. the armored vehicles heavily armed as well. and tear gas had to be deployed there as well as the protestors who were defying the tear gas, defying their efforts, even in some cases, throwing back some of the canisters and throwing rocks and bottles. let's bring in contributor jim ka va gnaw. we've seen this line, jim, you're joining us now, of police. we're seeing more vehicles here. seems to be somewhat of a lull based on the activity we saw earlier. what could be happening now? >> i think they've made a couple of arrests. we saw some of that earlier. they've disbursed the crowd and they've, you know, moved with

some small groups around as mark potter described. thought they had some people behind the mall over there. so they moved a lot of officers in and we also saw one of the bear cat armored vehicles leave. it might have been moving to another position like where those people were spotted behind the mall as a possibility. when they get groups that move to a different part, you know, a block away or somewhere else, they have to move some officers over there to try to encounter them. chris hayes reported a couple incidents just like that where a half a dozen officers would encounter protestors on a side street and ordered them to leave and so forth. that's what happens when a crowd disburses. we haven't heard anymore reporting, just that one instance of gunfire to police and maybe return gunfire. >> it's important to point out here the events leading up to

the law enforcement response last night. when we were reporting, we thought it was basically people violating the curfew and protestors getting out of hand that may have sparked the response we saw found out when ron johnson spoke that it was in fact to somebody on a roof, armed in a shooting with one victim shot in critical condition at this time. it wasn't in response to enforcing the curfew. could that be the case tonight? that what we are seeing is in response to something else that we find out about later on? >> there was a witness on msnbc a little while ago who described the protesters maybe a thousand strong. she said peacefully marching toward the police line. i don't know if that's what sparked the police response. somebody sparked the response to

gas out front to turn or move them back. we don't know what the first thing was. maybe it was, as the witness described, she said she was an army, military veteran, that they were just marching toward the police line. it could have been that. it could have been some other violence. at any rate, there was gas deployed and the crowd dispersed and of course a lot more officers tonight, francis. we have all watched it. and the first night all the tear gas was deployed, there is a lot of officers there now. not just tactical swat swat officers but a lot of officers in normal riot gear. this is the scene with the orange gun. that's a bean bag shotgun. i fires a bean bag round.

it's like getting hit with a baseball. it makes you turn away and run. >> you are comparing the scene from the first night that drew the outrage initially. so much has happened since then the past seven, eight days we have seen. surveillance video just released of michael brown, which again the family called character assassination and sparked so much anger and unrest with these protesters already. and the release of the officer who shot him name and we saw the anger when the curfew was imposed saying it violates their right to assemble and it will provoke some more. some protesters want to get the message out or want more

information as far as the investigation in to the shooting to be up front. there are a handful that maybe are classified as troublemakers. who doesn't need to get the word out but are taking advantage of the situation. we spoke to some witnesses out there today and some reporters who describe some of those people as younger people. there was a lack of adults out there, as well. could be that as well as in some cases diluting the message of the protesters. >> that's right. the scene described as a young man, maybe frustrated or economically pushed out of jobs in the area and young men have had a lot of contact with the police. i apologize for interrupting you. right now there is new information we want to get out there. bring in chris hayes with that

information leading as far as information on the shooting of michael brown. chris? >> hey. how are you? >> good. so significant information that you are bringing us this evening. >> so, there's an autopsy conducted by the medical examiner and family conducted an independent autopsy. that autopsy report is leaked to the "new york times." i've seen some of the report. the details are six shots all in the front. one braising the arm and it appears two in the head, one in the eye. and one which i think will be looked at the most intention in or near the top of the skull. >> wow. that's -- we don't know the facts. we don't know what happened to bring that about. this is obviously through an independent autopsy opposed to

an autopsy -- i think later we will try to do live to a camera here if we can. >> this information comes as the attorney general eric holder just ordered a federal medical examiner to perform another autopsy. >> that's right. >> there will be -- which is highly unusual move. there will be three autopsies now. at this point, it is hard to know whether it will help or hinder the investigation. obviously if there are discrepancies between the three, you can imagine they will be used by the defense. to cast doubt on the situation. if there is no discrepancies between the three, if they all line up, presumably that would help whatever possible future prosecution might happen. the shot in the top of the skull, we don't know how that shot happened. we have eyewitness reports --

several eyewitness reports of the officer in question approaching officer and shooting. michael brown was on the ground according to reports. it is possible that a different set of actions led to that. >> i was able to vaguely gaze over the report, as well. did it indicate the shots were fired from a distance? >> i believe in the preliminary report, as of now, it is unclear or has not been disclosed the distance from which the shots were fired. perhaps that information will be forthcoming tomorrow. there's expectation we may be hearing from the family about this report tomorrow. that's what we know a of now. we know one key fact here is that none of the bullets landed

in the back, which is significant in as far as had there been a bullet in the back that -- i think it is fair to say -- >> based on the witness accounts we have heard in the course of last week. >> that's right. all three of those -- all three of those reports have indicated that the police -- or the police fired at michael brown. and none of them -- if that is the case and again this will all be, we think, come before a court of law -- >> again, we are talking about this, this federal medical examiner to perform another autopsy along with the st. louis county medical examiner's office that determined that michael brown died of gunshot wounds but other details have not been released. this is information from an

independent autopsy. a private, family autopsy that shows michael brown was shot six times from the front, twice in the head. i believe in the arm, as well, right? >> that's right. appears to be one that grazed the arm. just to go through so folks are familiar, the basic contours of the eyewitness testimony, there are three different eyewitnesses. one i spoke to directly after the event happened. there was some police -- mike brown, dorian johnson, approached michael brown and dorian johnson in the middle of the street and told them to get off the street. dorian johnson said they got off the street and there ensued action at the window of the car with the officer and during that the officer pulled mike brown in. sorry, there's some police

activity here. >> go ahead. >> any way. so there was a gunshot. the gunshot was fired from the car in the account of more than one eyewitness. michael brown headed the other direction and ended up losing hi life and shot by the officer in the street. >> well, this is significant information that will certainly open up so much more as far as how these protesters will digest this and how they will react. was there any indication, again, this is late-breaking word. just coming out from other news organizations, as well who are reporting this. the family autopsy shows michael brown was shot six times. i'm sure word is spreading with the protesters. it doesn't seem there is any from the scene. live shot we are having. we are coming up on an hour before the curfew will be imposed there. >> the protesters are down to 40 or 50 who have been pushed back by tear gas to at this point an a unknown location as far as

where we are. they have pushed the media back. so you can't see. a lot of tactical vehicles. we don't know where the protesters are. >> they know about this or how their reaction would be? does that change the dynamic of how the protests go? >> i will tell you this, this will be all anyone in ferguson is talking about tomorrow. this is going to be -- you know, particularly the the tail of shot once in the top of the skull is going to be front and center tomorrow. >> absolutely. if you are just joining us, the top of the hour here on msnbc we are following coverage here after another night of new clashes and confrontations here with police and protesters. as there are reports of shots fired.