On Tuesday, Travis McMichael, Gregory McMichael and William “Roddie” Bryan, the three white men involved in the killing of 25-year old Ahmaud Arbery, were been found guilty of all counts in the federal trial of the three men charged with hate crimes.
The jury determined that the three men violated Arbery’s civil rights in the fatal chase and targeted him because he was Black. The McMichaels were also found guilty of attempted kidnapping and firearms charges for using and carrying a firearm during a crime of violence, CNN reported.
As noted by CNN, “McMichael and his father, Greg McMichael, pursued Arbery after seeing him running in their neighborhood outside the Georgia port city of Brunswick. Neighbor William ‘Roddie’ Bryan joined in his own pickup and recorded cellphone video of Travis McMichael firing the fatal shots.”
All three, CNN’s Jim Sciutto reports, have been found guilty on all counts of federal hate crime charges.
Reacting to the verdict, Wanda Cooper-Jones, mother of Ahmaud Arbery, called out the US Department of Justice for originally agreeing to accept a plea deal from her son’s killers in federal court.
“I now want to address the members of the DOJ. I’m very thankful that you guys brought these charges of hate crime, but back on January 31, you guys accepted a plea deal with these three murderers who took my son’s life,” Cooper-Jones said, according to CNN.
“They ignored my cry. I begged them. Even after the family stood before the judge and asked them, asked the judge to not take this plea deal, the lead prosecutor, Tara Lyons, stood up and asked the judge to ignore the family’s cry. That’s not justice for Ahmaud,” she said.
Arbery’s mother said that today’s verdict wouldn’t have happened “if it wasn’t for the fight that the family put up.”
Breaking: A jury has found the three White men who killed Ahmaud Arbery guilty on a federal hate crime charge, backing prosecutors’ case that the men chased the 25-year-old through the streets of the Satilla Shores neighborhood, because he was Black.
— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) February 22, 2022
