US convicts three men in hate crime killing of Black jogger Ahmaud Arbery

Federal court sentenced father and son McMichaels to life in prison while William Bryan, who recorded the killing, got 35 years in prison.

Three white men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery in a Georgia neighborhood faced a second round of criminal penalties Monday, Aug. 8, 2022, for federal hate crimes committed in the deadly pursuit of the 25-year-old Black man. (AP)

The white father and son convicted of murder in Ahmaud Arbery’s fatal shooting after they chased the 25-year-old Black man through a Georgia neighborhood were sentenced Monday to life in prison for committing a federal hate crime.

US District Court Judge Lisa Godbey Wood handed down the sentences against Travis McMichael, 36, and his father, Greg McMichael, 66, reiterating the gravity of the February 2020 killing that shattered their Brunswick community. William “Roddie” Bryan, 52, who recorded cellphone video of the slaying, was sentenced to 35 years in prison.

“A young man is dead. Ahmaud Arbery will be forever 25. And what happened, a jury found, happened because he’s Black,” Wood said.

The sentences imposed Monday brought an end to more than two years of criminal proceedings against the men responsible for Arbery’s slaying, which along with the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis and fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor in Kentucky fueled a wave of protests across the country against the killings of unarmed Black people.

The McMichaels were previously sentenced to life without parole in state court for Arbery’s murder and had asked the judge to divert them to a federal prison to serve their sentences, saying they were worried about their safety in the state prison system.

Bryan had sought to serve his federal sentence first. Wood declined all three requests.

In February, a federal jury convicted the McMichaels and Bryan of violating Arbery’s civil rights, concluding they targeted him because of his race. All three were also found guilty of attempted kidnapping, and the McMichaels were convicted of using guns in the commission of a violent crime.

The McMichaels armed themselves with guns and used a pickup truck to chase Arbery after he ran past their home on Feb. 23, 2020. Bryan, a neighbor, joined the pursuit in his own truck and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael shooting Arbery with a shotgun. The McMichaels told police they suspected Arbery was a burglar, but investigators determined he was unarmed and had committed no crimes.

“I’m very thankful,” Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, told reporters outside the courthouse after all three sentences had been imposed. “It’s been a long fight. I’m so thankful God gave us the strength to continue to fight.”

In court, Greg McMichael addressed the Arbery family, saying their loss was “beyond description.”

“I’m sure my words mean very little to you, but I want to assure you I never wanted any of this to happen," he said. “There was no malice in my heart or my son’s heart that day.”

Bryan said he was sorry for what happened to Arbery.

“I never intended any harm to him, and I never would have played any role in what happened if I knew then what I know now," he said.

In giving Bryan a lower sentence, Wood noted he had not brought a gun to the pursuit of Arbery and preserved his cell phone video, which was crucial to the prosecutions.

Travis McMichael declined to address the court, but his attorney, Amy Lee Copeland, said a lighter sentence would be more consistent with what similarly charged defendants have received in other cases, noting that the officer who killed Floyd in Minneapolis, Derek Chauvin, got 21 years in prison for violating Floyd’s civil rights, though he was not charged with targeting Floyd because of his race.

Greg McMichael's attorney, A.J. Balbo, also cited the Chauvin sentence as well as his client's age and health problems, which he said include a stroke and depression.

During the February hate crimes trial, prosecutors fortified their case that Arbery’s killing was motivated by racism by showing the jury roughly two dozen text messages and social media posts in which Travis McMichael and Bryan used racist slurs and made disparaging comments about Black people.

“The evidence we presented at trial proved ... what so many people felt in their hearts when they watched the video of Ahmaud’s tragic and unnecessary death: This would have never happened if he had been white,” Christopher Perras, another prosecutor, said Monday.

A state Superior Court judge imposed life sentences for the McMichaels and Bryan in January for Arbery's murder, with both McMichaels denied any chance of parole. All three defendants have remained jailed in coastal Glynn County, in the custody of U.S. marshals, while awaiting sentencing after their federal convictions.

Because they were first charged and convicted of murder in a state court, protocol would have them turned them over to the Georgia Department of Corrections to serve their life terms in a state prison.

Copeland said during Monday's hearing for Travis McMichael that her client has received hundreds of threats that he will be killed as soon as he arrives at state prison and that his photo has been circulated there on illegal phones.

“I am concerned your honor that my client effectively faces a back door death penalty," she said, adding that “retribution and revenge” were not sentencing factors, even for a defendant who is “publicly reviled.”

Arbery’s father, Marcus Arbery Sr., said Travis McMichael had shown his son no mercy and deserved to “rot" in state prison.

“You killed him because he was a Black man and you hate Black people," he said.

“You deserve no mercy.”

Source: AP

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Travis, Gregory McMichael sentenced on Arbery hate-crime charges; William 'Roddie' Bryan next

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Travis and Gregory McMichael, already sentenced to life in prison for killing Ahmaud Arbery, were each given an additional life sentence Monday for federal hate-crime violations — and told they must serve their time in state prison, which they contend will be far more dangerous.

Amy Lee Copeland, Travis McMichael’s attorney, said in U.S. District Court in Brunswick, Ga., that her client has received hundreds of threats and faces “an effective back-door death penalty” if he’s sent to Georgia state prison — a system Copeland noted is under federal investigation for alleged violent and deplorable conditions.

But Arbery’s family vehemently opposed allowing his killers to choose where they will be incarcerated, noting that the young Black man who was gunned down while jogging will never make choices about his life again.

"How can you ask for mercy? You didn’t give my boy no mercy,” Marcus Arbery said as he asked U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood to hand down the “stiffest penalty that the court allows.”

The elder Arbery called his son, who was 25 when he was killed, “the greatest sunshine of my life” and condemned his killers as “devils.”

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Godbey Wood sentenced Travis McMichael, 36, to life in prison plus 10 years, and his father, Gregory McMichael, 66, to life in prison plus seven years. They were convicted in federal court in February of attempted kidnapping, a weapons violation and violently interfering with Arbery’s right to use a public street because he was Black.

The federal jury found their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, 52, guilty of attempted kidnapping and violently interfering with Arbery’s right to use a public street because he was Black; he is scheduled to be sentenced later Monday.

The men, all White, already face life sentences on state murder charges following their November 2021 convictions, with no possibility of parole for the McMichaels.

Godbey Wood said the state sentence had custodial priority for the McMichaels, since they were convicted and sentenced in state court before the federal trial. That means the father and son will likely spend the rest of their lives in state prison. They have two weeks to appeal.

In court filings, Gregory McMichael raised safety concerns similar to his son’s in seeking to serve his time in a federal facility, which tend to have better amenities, including healthcare. Bryan has argued he deserves a lesser sentence than his neighbors in part because, unlike them, he was not armed when he pursued Arbery.

The Post's Hannah Knowles recaps the trial of Travis McMichael, Greg McMichael and William "Roddy" Bryan, who were convicted in the murder of Ahmaud Arbery. (Video: Joshua Carroll, Allie Caren/The Washington Post)

Addressing the court on Monday, the elder McMichael apologized to his son, saying he should have “never put him in that situation” of shooting Arbery. He also apologized to his wife and thanked her for standing by him. “You are a better wife than I deserve,” he said.

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Speaking to Arbery’s family, the elder McMichael said: “I’m sure that my words mean very little to you, but I want to assure you I never wanted any of this to happen. There was no malice in my heart and my son’s heart today.”

Travis McMichael declined to speak in during his sentencing hearing. In seeking an order that he serve his sentence in federal prison, Copeland, his lawyer, said she understood “the rich irony ... of expressing that my client will face vigilante justice himself.”

Arbery, an avid jogger, was out for a run when the McMichaels and Bryan chased him in pickup trucks and then killed him in Satilla Shores, Ga., on Feb. 23, 2020, in an attack widely described as a “modern-day lynching.” The case drew little national attention until video of the shooting was released that May. It then became part of the broader national debate over racial injustice spurred by the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police that same month, and the police killing earlier in the year of Breonna Taylor.

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Prosecutors offered a plea deal to the McMichaels before the federal trial: The father and son, who had both denied in their state murder trial that race was a factor in their actions, would have to admit under oath that they killed Arbery because he was Black. In exchange, they would serve 30 years in federal prison.

But the deal fell apart at the last minute in stunning fashion, after Arbery’s family strongly rejected the idea of letting the young man’s killers choose where they would do their time.

“Granting these men their preferred conditions of confinement will defeat me,” Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, said in court in January. “It gives them one last chance to spit in my face after murdering my son.”

Arbery’s family tearfully renewed their appeal Monday.

“If they had left him alone that day, they would have been fine. But they tortured him,” Kimberly Arbery, Ahmaud’s aunt, said of her slain nephew. “Give these people what they deserve.”

Another aunt, Ruby Arbery, said Gregory McMichael failed his son by participating in the chasing and killing of Arbery.

“Seems like a generational curse: like father, like son,” she said. “I don’t want them to have an easy life, because we will never have an easy life again. If they could bring Ahmaud back, they could have an easy life. But they chose to take a life, so they don’t deserve an easy life.

Outside the courthouse, Arbery’s supporters gathered for a prayer vigil. Arbery’s family was accompanied by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a longtime civil rights leader, as well as their attorney, Lee Merritt.

Leigh McMichael, Gregory McMichael’s wife, was also photographed at the courthouse.

This is a developing story. It will be updated.

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