Georgia Judge Timothy Walmsley sentenced three White killers of 25-year-old Black Ahmaud Abery to life in prison, two without possibility of parole. One, William “Roddy” Bryan, now 52 will have to serve a mandatory 30 years, before being eligible for parole. The defendants appealed their conviction and sentencing. The three are likely to die in Georgia prisons as Ahmaud Arbery’s family requested at the sentencing hearing.
Now the trio, Bryan, and father and son Greg McMichael 62, and Travis Mc-Michael 35 will begin a federal hate crime trial February 7. The three chased 25-year-old Abery five minutes around a Brunswick, Ga subdivision in two pickup trucks, cornering the jogger, hitting him with one truck. Finally, Travis McMichael pumped three 12-gauge shotgun blasts that killed Arbery.
At the federal hate crime trial evidence may be introduced that Travis, said “f—ing n—-r” as Arbery laid dying with no one offering cpr and other medical assistance. Also expected to be presented will be evidence that the former prosecutor, Jackie Johnson, refused to indict the three. In another trial former prosecutor Johnson will herself be prosecuted for several felonies that grew out of not prosecuting the three killers.
It took 73 days before the killers were indicted, by a second prosecutor.
Often police and civilian killers of Blacks are not prosecuted. But the Arbery case was brought into public view outside Brunswick by a leaked video of Arbery’s chase and murder. The video surfaced after the George Floyd awakening of how Blacks and people of color are treated in America. The video had been in the control of the first prosecutor, Jackie Johnson. She was indicted, and yet to be tried for many felonies related to prosecutorial misconduct.
An interesting collaboration of the Transformative Justice Coalition which includes many organizations, along with Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. Al Sharpton has kept the case front and center of national attention. Attorneys Barbara Arnwine, and Darryl Jones, co-leaders of Transformative Jus-tice Coalition supported the Arbery family and the Movement builders in Bruns-wick and Glynn County co-ordinating their activities with media and organizations around the country.
Attorney Barbara Arnwine challenged supporters not to get distracted or reduce their fight for justice in the federal courts. “We are just beginning in this justice battle, and we can’t let up now”, Attorney Arnwine said.
Police and prosecutorial misconduct are also in focus in other places around the nation. Hight Point, N.C. law enforcement are under the microscope of justice fighters. Eighteen-year-old Frederic Cox was gunned down in Living Water Baptist Church in High Point by a plain clothes Davidson County deputy. The killing happened at a funeral in which two cars sprayed seventy rounds from three guns outside the church. Ten days after the killing, Tenicka Shannon, mother of Frederick Cox, was informed that her son was killed, not by bullets from the cars, but from bullets from a so far unnamed deputy. More than 60 days since Cox’s killing and answers to a mountain of questions have not been answered by Davidson County authorities. The Cox family is represented by high profile attorney Ben Crump.
