Officer Wilson's initial description of Mr. Brown focuses on three things: his size, that he was walking in the middle of the street with a friend, Dorian Johnson, and that Mr. Brown was wearing socks with the image of green marijuana leaves. He recalls his first verbal exchange with Mr. Brown in stark terms.

I see them walking down the middle of the street. And first thing that struck me was they’re walking in the middle of the street. I had already seen a couple cars trying to pass, but they couldn’t have traffic normal because they were in the middle, so one had to stop to let the car go around and then another car would come. And the next thing I noticed was the size of the individuals because either the first one was really small or the second one was really big.

And just for the conversation, I didn’t know this then, but the first one’s name was Dorian Johnson, the second one was Michael Brown. That was discovered, I think, the following day is when I learned the names. I had never seen them before.