Early Monday morning, 36-year-old Travis McMichael was sentenced to life in prison plus ten years follinwing his hate crime conviction in Ahmaud Arbery’s death.
McMichael’s attorney had requested that he serve his sentence in federal prison, but the judge ordered him to serve it in state prison.
Judge Lisa Godbey Wood of the U.S. District Court noted that McMichael had gotten a fair trial, “the kind of trial that Ahmaud Arbery did not receive before he was shot and killed.”
She said, “You killed a man on February 23, 2020. The events depicted in the video are seared in the annals of this court and no doubt in your mind forever,”
Attorney Amy Lee Copeland sought a federal prison sentence for McMichael, stating that he had received “hundreds of threats” and that being in state custody would probably result in his death.
In addition, she expressed concern about an investigation by the Department of Justice into inmate violence in Georgia state prisons.
McMichael was ordered to serve his term in state prison at the prosecution’s request and members of Arbery’s family. His sentence is the first in a series of three.
Greg McMichael, McMichael’s father, and William “Roddie” Bryan, a neighbor, both have sentencing dates set for Monday.
