Jury selection began this week for the men who chased down and murdered Ahmaud Arbery in broad daylight. The men killed Arbery in cold blood, completely unprovoked, as he was out for a jog in February 2020.
Gregory McMichael, his son Travis McMichael and their neighbor William Bryan Jr. are charged with malice and felony murder on the state level. At the time of the killing, Georgia did not have a single law against hate crimes, which is why they were not charged by the state of Georgia with one.
However, earlier this year a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Georgia indicted the men on hate crime charges after public outrage and the release of the disturbing video. This week the state of Georgia begins its trial, after which they will have to answer to the federal hate crime charges. While we hope justice prevails, let’s not forget that after chasing down, shooting, and killing Ahmaud Arbery in broad daylight, the three men were allowed to leave the scene and weren’t arrested until after the video of the incident was made public in early May just under 3 months later. Let’s also remember it took the recusal of more than one Georgia prosecutor for charges to eventually be filed, and finally let’s hope that the state and federal courts handle this case better than local law enforcement did.
