Ahmaud Arbery Killers Found Guilty of Hate Crimes
A jury has determined that the three white Georgia men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery violated a federal hate-crime statute by depriving the 25-year-old Black man of his right to use a public street because of the color of his skin.
Landwebs
A jury has determined that the three white Georgia men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery violated a federal hate-crime statute by depriving the 25-year-old Black man of his right to use a public street because of the color of his skin, reports the New York Times. Travis McMichael, his father, Gregory McMichael, and their neighbor William Bryan, were also found guilty of attempted kidnapping. In addition, the McMichaels were found guilty of one count each of brandishing or discharging a firearm during a violent crime.
The men now face up to life in prison for the federal crimes, on top of the life sentences they received earlier this year in state court after being convicted of Arbery’s murder, with only Bryan eligible for parole.
The federal convictions ensure that the defendants will receive significant prison time even if their state convictions are overturned or their sentences reduced on appeal. During the federal trial, lawyers for the three defendants argued that the men had not been motivated by racial animus, but rather because Arbery seemed to them like a potential crime suspect.
Prosecutors, however, presented copious evidence that showed that the men harbored coarse racist views about Black people, submitting as evidence numerous uses of racist epithets and racial insults by the men and even text messages recovered from Bryan’s cellphone showing that he opposed his daughter’s relationship with a Black man, who he described using a racial slur.
Travis McMichael, the man who used his Remington shotgun to fatally shoot Arbery three times at close range, was revealed to have repeatedly used racist slurs, and expressed the desire to see violence and death visited upon Black people.
