Michael Brown Witness, Whose ‘Hands Up, Don’t Shoot’ Lie Won’t Die, Fatally Shot

Michael Brown Witness, Whose ‘Hands Up, Don’t Shoot’ Lie Won’t Die, Fatally Shot

Dorian Johnson, Michael Brown’s friend who was with him in the final moments of his life, died of injuries sustained in a Sunday morning shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, according to Fox 2 Now. Johnson was 33.

A spokesperson for the Ferguson Police Department reported that “one person is in custody and charges are being sought through the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.”

Dorian Johnson, gangster buddy of Michael Brown, was shot to death on Sunday, less than a mile away from the Brown shooting.

Johnson told the famous LIE that Brown had his hands up and was saying "Don't shoot" when he was shot by a police officer.

This lie sparked and fed… pic.twitter.com/mjZvnEf3VH

— john jackson (@pvtjokerus) September 8, 2025

Johnson’s legacy will be the lies he told after Brown’s death — lies with national consequences that ignited the wave of racial unrest that followed and fueled the Black Lives Matter movement.

Prior to his death, Brown was what Prof. Jacobson once accurately described as a “low-level street thug who had just strong-arm robbed a convenience store.” It’s true. Just minutes before his life ended, he stole a box of cigars from a small market. When the owner tried to stop him, Brown shoved him out of the way. In the video below, Brown is seen with a companion, presumably Johnson.

Brown’s death instantly made him a martyr. After he was shot by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson on August 9, 2014, Johnson told police that Brown running away from him. According to Johnson, Brown had raised his hands in surrender and cried out, “don’t shoot,” before the final shot was fired.

That account quickly became a rallying cry for protesters. The phrase “hands up, don’t shoot” spread across the nation, symbolizing outrage over police brutality and racial injustice. The unrest that followed, better known as the Ferguson riots, drew international attention and marked a turning point in American race relations, ultimately galvanizing the Black Lives Matter movement into a powerful national force.

Dorian "Hands Up, Don't Shoot" Johnson, witness in Michael Brown's 2014 killing, fatally shot https://t.co/7yYY62166p pic.twitter.com/Y870f63ijA

— Ben (XY) (@AndStrats) September 9, 2025

Despite the story of police brutality being promoted by the Left and amplified by the media, local prosecutors did not charge Officer Wilson in Brown’s death.

So the Obama-era Department of Justice launched a comprehensive investigation. In an 86-page report released in March 2015, the DOJ concluded that Johnson had lied to police. The “hands up, don’t shoot” narrative was false. The evidence in the case corroborated Officer Wilson’s account of the incident and conflicted with statements made by Johnson and other so-called “witnesses” to the shooting.

The report stated:

The Department has determined that the evidence does not support charging a violation of federal law.

…

Federal authorities reviewed physical, ballistic, forensic, and crime scene evidence; medical reports and autopsy reports, including an independent autopsy performed by the United States Department of Defense Armed Forces Medical Examiner Service.

Johnson was one of several witnesses to say that Brown held his hands up in surrender in his final moments. The report notes: [emphasis added]

Some of those accounts are inaccurate because they are inconsistent with the physical and forensic evidence; some of those accounts are materially inconsistent with that witness’s own prior statements with no explanation, credible for otherwise, as to why those accounts changed over time. Certain other witnesses who originally stated Brown had his hands up in surrender recanted their original accounts, admitting that they did not witness the shooting or parts of it, despite what they initially reported either to federal or local law enforcement or to the media. Prosecutors did not rely on those accounts when making a prosecutive decision.

But the fact that the ‘hands up, don’t shoot’ narrative was thoroughly disproven by both state and federal investigations makes little difference now. What matters is perception: that version of events is the one that lodged itself in the public consciousness, the one repeated endlessly by activists, politicians, and the media. And despite the evidence, it remains the version that millions still believe, shaping attitudes, fueling division, and rewriting history in real time.

On the tenth anniversary of Brown’s death, one woman recycled the long-disproven lie on social media. While the post drew plenty of supportive responses, it also faced pushback — conservatives were quick to add community notes to set the record straight.

A decade ago, a police officer shot and killed Michael Brown Jr., an unarmed Black teenager with his hands up in Ferguson, Missouri.

Michael’s life matters. Black Lives Matter, and we will continue to say it until it becomes the truth in this nation’s eyes. pic.twitter.com/zo3gdcBsMS

— Nina Turner (@ninaturner) August 9, 2024

Why do you always lie? pic.twitter.com/Pc4T6cZYKC

— Leftism (@LeftismForU) August 9, 2024

Although this woman faced some resistance, there are still millions of people who refuse to acknowledge the truth. There is a reason for that.

In a previous article about this case, Prof. Jacobson concluded:

‘Hands up, don’t shoot’ is a lie that won’t die because it’s a lie that has been the core Black Lives Matter narrative for a decade. Black Lives Matter was launched based on a fraud, and that fraud continues to be perpetrated by people who are wholly ignorant or wholly dishonest.

🚨 Ferguson’s Legacy of Lies: “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” man Dies in Black-on-Black Bloodbath

Dorian Johnson—the thug who fabricated the “hands up, don’t shoot” myth to excuse Michael Brown’s violent attack on Officer Wilson—is now a victim of the same pathological violence he… pic.twitter.com/vcuuYO7wQU

— Rafael Santiago (@RaphySantiag) September 8, 2025

Elizabeth writes commentary for Legal Insurrection and The Washington Examiner. She is an academy fellow at The Heritage Foundation. Please follow Elizabeth on X or LinkedIn.

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