Bishop Derrick Robinson caught MSNBC host Tamron Hall off-guard on Monday when he accused police in Ferguson, Missouri, of setting up 20-year-old Jeffrey Williams in the shooting of two officers last week during a protest outside police headquarters.
“I really believe he was set up,” Robinson said. “And I really believe that.”
“Set up by who?” Hall asked.
“Police,” the guest answered. “I think he was set up by — I would go as far to say some of the police. The story just does not add up.”
Hall pushed back at the unfounded claim, telling the pastor, “Obviously I can’t let you say that he was set up by police.” She also asked if there was any “evidence or proof” supporting his big allegation and noted that the suspect has already confessed.
“I think he was not only, he was beaten, when he was brutally beaten when he was arrested, and I think he was coerced to, without, he was not even given the opportunity to see counsel,” Robinson said, also claiming that police “beat him to confessing.”
“We have no proof of these allegations and you have provided me with no proof of this,” Hall reiterated.
The strangest part about Robinson’s claim is that, just minutes earlier, he claimed that he talked to the shooting suspect and “he shared with me that he wished he had not done it.” When asked if Williams was targeting police during the shooting, the pastor replied, “I know he wasn’t targeting the protesters.”
Watch the strange segment via MSNBC below (the “set-up” claims start at around 3:20):
(H/T: TheBlaze.com / Mediaite)