On August 9, 2014, an unarmed African-American named Michael Brown was fatally shot by a police officer on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri. Anonymous, an infamous hacker organization, threatened to reveal the officer’s information to the public until the police admitted to its faults in regards to the situation. Anonymous, tired of law enforcements’ silence, revealed a name through Twitter, but it has been determined that the group gave the wrong name. It has only recently been revealed by the police that the officer’s name is Darren Wilson, a Caucasian male.

Some accounts even say that Brown, a black teenager, was in the process of surrendering. The circumstances of his death have caused outrage amongst not only the Ferguson population but also amongst the population nationwide. With media portraying Brown as a helpless victim and Wilson as the trigger-friendly and racist antagonist, it’s really no surprise why the Ferguson police wanted to shed a different light on the matter. The police released a surveillance video of a black man alleged to be Brown robbing a minim art, hoping to alter the public’s opinion of Brown being a mere helpless victim.

Now, in the event of Ferguson, the media portrays victims and villains. There is no doubt that Brown should be alive had all things gone accordingly and that Wilson should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. However, the police are not only just the villains, but also the victims. Since the shooting, the police has been maligned, vilified, and altogether blamed for the incident. After Anonymous revealed the wrong name, that individual and his mother received death threats, severe enough to the point where the mother considered buying a gun. What makes it worse, this isn’t the first time Anonymous has tabbed the wrong perpetrator. During the Amanda Todd suicide of 2011, Anonymous revealed a 32-year old man who had supposedly harassed Todd to the point of suicide. As it turned out, Anonymous was wrong and later blamed another individual. Sure, Anonymous correctly tabbed the police officer who had pepper sprayed a group of Wall Street protestors in 2011, but are all their efforts really worth two perfectly innocent men feeling endangered and publicly threatened? One thing is clear: there is one looming villain in this story that hasn’t been recognized. And here’s a hint: it’s not the police.