Even before the murder of George Floyd was broadcast to the world, setting off a summer of protests and debate about racist inequities in the justice system, the video of Ahmaud Arbery being chased down by three white men shook me to my core. It was the kind of thing you expected to see in the state of Georgia in 1950, not 2020.
And, at first, the local justice system treated it the old-fashioned away, by sweeping it under the rug. Only when video emerged a few months later were the assailants charged with murder.
I figured convictions were likely, but I was very worried about the consequences of an acquittal. I felt about the same as I did as we approached the Derek Chauvin verdict earlier this year - or even last year’s election, which I figured Biden was likely to win but wouldn’t rest easy until we knew Trump had been beaten. The downside risk was relatively small, but potentially calamitous.
The verdict is in: guilty, guilty, guilty.
A Georgia jury has convicted three white men of murder in the death of Ahmaud Arbery.
Travis McMichael, who shot fatally shot Arbery in February 2020, was convicted on all nine charges, including malice murder and four counts of felony murder.
McMichael's father, Gregory McMichael, 65, was found not guilty of malice murder, but was convicted on the remaining charges, including the felony murder counts.
The McMichael's neighbor, William "Roddie" Bryan, 53, was found guilty of three of the felony murder counts and a charge of criminal intent to commit a felony.
The jury verdicts were read in court by the presiding judge in the case, Timothy Walmsley.
The panel sent Walmsley a note on Wednesday afternoon that they had reached a verdict after deliberating about 11 hours over two days.
The panel began deliberating the nationally televised trial on Tuesday after hearing 13 days of evidence and listening to numerous witnesses, including the testimony of defendant Travis McMichael, 35, who claimed he shot the unarmed Arbery with a shotgun in self-defense during a face-to-face fight over his weapon.
Meanwhile, the local District Attorney who initially refused to indict the McMichaels and Bryan now faces her own criminal charges.
The former prosecutor charged with misconduct for her handling of the Ahmaud Arbery case was booked at a Georgia jail on Wednesday and released.
Former Brunswick Judicial Circuit District Attorney Jackie Johnson turned herself in Wednesday morning at the Glynn County jail, county Undersheriff Ron Corbett said. Jail records show she was released on her own recognizance, meaning she did not have to pay a cash bond.
A grand jury indicted Johnson, 49, last week on a felony charge of violating her oath of office and a misdemeanor count of obstructing police. Johnson was the area’s top prosecutor when three white men chased and fatally shot Arbery last year. The indictment alleges she used her position to discourage police from making arrests in the 25-year-old Black man’s killing.
Had a video not come to light, they might have gotten away with it. I often bemoan the way viral videos and online mobs can distort the justice system, but this time around, the public outrage actually did lead to a just result.
After Kyle Rittenhouse was (correctly) acquitted, many people said this proved that the justice system was irrevocably racist and could not be reformed. I expect many of these people to say these convictions, in a case where the undertones of racism were far more obvious, prove nothing.
I think it proves a lot. There are people still living in Georgia and the Deep South who remember when white people getting convicted of murdering an Black man was as likely as, well, Georgia electing an African-American U.S. Senator.
That this horrendous incident happened at all proves there is still much work to be done. You can’t point to this case and say racism is over. But it does show that justice can be done if we demand that it be done.
May God Bless the family of Ahmaud Arbery. Hopefully this will give them some comfort and closure.