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Thread: Gregory and Travis McMichael Sentenced to LWOP in 2020 GA Murder of Ahmaud Arbery

  1. #21
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Neil's Avatar
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    New death sentences don’t happen in Missouri either the only thing that’s effectively keeping the death penalty alive is the states hard right tilt. Georgia’s blue trending path is definitely paving way for it turn into Virginia 2.0 in terms of abolition.

  2. #22
    Moderator Bobsicles's Avatar
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    The problem is that big urban cities tend to vote blue while smaller urban/rural cities tend to vote red. That’s why New York City is the reason New York always votes dem, according to my uncle. He lives in Syracuse, one of the largest cities in New York, and told me that the city had almost zilch Biden Signs during the 2020 election. Nearly every yard had a Trump sign
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  3. #23
    Administrator Aaron's Avatar
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    There are very few blue states, only blue cities...
    Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next products.

    "They will hurt you. They will hurt your grandma, these people. The root cause of this is there's no discipline in the homes, they don't go to school, you know, they live off the government, no personal accountability, and they just beat people up for no reason, and it's disgusting." - Former Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters

  4. #24
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Neil's Avatar
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    I mentioned this last year even if this case would’ve qualified Dunham still would’ve spun it in someway. No case is eligible for the death penalty in Dunham’s eyes. Dunham knows it too.

  5. #25
    Administrator Aaron's Avatar
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    If McMichael had been sentenced to death Dunham would have simply found another reason to complain.
    Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next products.

    "They will hurt you. They will hurt your grandma, these people. The root cause of this is there's no discipline in the homes, they don't go to school, you know, they live off the government, no personal accountability, and they just beat people up for no reason, and it's disgusting." - Former Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters

  6. #26
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Neil's Avatar
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    Richard Dieter was more civil on executions. Dieter made an attempt at least to provide both sides of the argument. Dunham attacks it every chance he gets and will viciously attack anyone in support of it.

  7. #27
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    Three men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery sentenced to life in prison

    The 3 white men were found guilty of felony murder in November in the fatal shooting of Arbery, a Black man who was running in their neighborhood when they confronted him.

    By Janelle Griffith
    NBC News

    The three white men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery were sentenced Friday to life in prison, with a judge denying any chance of parole for the father and son who armed themselves and initiated the deadly pursuit of the Black man in February 2020.

    The life sentences for Travis McMichael, who fatally shot Arbery; and his father, Gregory McMichael, do not carry the possibility of parole. Their neighbor William "Roddie" Bryan will be eligible, however, Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley said. Bryan must serve at least 30 years in prison before he is eligible for parole.

    All three men were convicted of murder and other charges by a Glynn County jury in November in the pursuit and fatal shooting of Arbery on Feb. 23, 2020.

    Walmsley called Arbery's killing "callous" and said it occurred because "confrontation was being sought."

    Before announcing the sentences, the judge asked the courtroom to sit in silence for one minute to illustrate, he said, a fraction of the time Arbery was running in terror from the men before he was killed.

    "He left his home to go for a run and ended up running for his life," Walmsley said.

    The sentences are in line with the request from prosecutor Linda Dunikoski, who recommended that Bryan get a chance at parole and that the McMichaels be denied that possibility. Dunikoski said the father and son showed no remorse or empathy for "the trapped and terrified Ahmaud Arbery."

    "There were so many opportunities to stop, to think," she said. "And here's the real problem: Greg McMichael was former law enforcement" and Travis McMichael had served in the Coast Guard.

    "So here we have some men who should have known better," she told the judge Friday morning. "Vigilantism always goes wrong."

    Defense attorneys argued in favor of parole for all three men.

    An attorney for Travis McMichael said he "should have the opportunity to show that he's grown, to show that he's changed." The attorney, Robert Rubin, said that a parole board should determine if and when Travis McMichael is released from prison.

    Arbery's parents and sister, who spoke before the sentences were handed down, asked the judge to show no lenience.

    "The man who killed my son has sat in this courtroom every single day next to his father. I'll never get that chance to sit next to my son ever again. Not at a general table. Not at a holiday. And not at a wedding," Ahmaud Arbery's father, Marcus Arbery, said before the sentence was announced. "His killers should spend the rest of their lives thinking about what they did and what they took from us and they should do it behind bars because me and my family have to do it for the rest of their life."

    The McMichaels armed themselves and pursued Arbery in a pickup truck after seeing him running in their neighborhood, Satilla Shores. Bryan joined the pursuit in his pickup truck and recorded video of the fatal encounter on his cellphone. Prosecutors said Arbery ran from the men for five minutes. Arbery was eventually trapped between the two pickup trucks and ended up in a confrontation with Travis McMichael, who was armed with a shotgun.

    Walmsley said he found "absolutely chilling" the portion of the video that shows Travis McMichael lifting his shotgun to fire at Arbery from 20 to 30 yards away.

    “And you watch that with context after hearing the evidence in this case, again, thinking about a young man who had been running at that point for almost five minutes,” Walmsley said. “And it is a chilling, truly disturbing scene.”

    In explaining his sentencing decision, Walmsley said he was also guided by “the defendants’ own words” after the shooting.

    Travis McMichael, the judge said, spoke of concern for his own well being while Arbery lay dying in the street.

    Meanwhile, Gregory McMichael attempted very early on to try to establish a narrative, Walmsley said.

    “He made comments like, ‘Ahmaud Arbery was trapped like a rat,’” and “effectively admitted to authorities that he wasn’t sure what Arbery had done wrong,” the judge said.

    The elder McMichael also said that he if he could have gotten a shot at Arbery, he would have taken it and referred to Arbery as an “a--hole,” Walmsley said.

    Walmsley said he also found it disturbing that Bryan placed blame on Arbery, saying, “If the guy would have stopped, this would have never happened.”

    The judge said he agreed with Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, who said earlier Friday in her victim impact statement, “When they could not scare or intimidate him, they killed him.”

    Walmsley said Arbery was killed “because individuals here in this courtroom took the law into their own hands.”

    The McMichaels and Bryan had been charged with one count of malice murder, four counts of felony murder, two counts of aggravated assault, and one count each of false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony.

    Travis McMichael, who fired at Arbery three times at close range, was convicted of all nine charges. Gregory McMichael was convicted of all charges except malice murder. Bryan was convicted of three counts of felony murder, one count of aggravated assault, false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony.

    The nearly all-white jury deliberated for about 10 hours before delivering its verdict.

    The malice murder and felony murder convictions both carry a minimum penalty of life in prison. Attorneys for all three men have said they intend to appeal the convictions.

    The McMichaels and Bryan were free for several weeks after the shooting. They were arrested only after the video that Bryan recorded was released and the case was taken over by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

    From the beginning, the handling of the case by local officials was called into question by Arbery's family and friends. Arbery's killing, along with that of George Floyd, sparked protests against racial injustice in America and beyond.

    Attorneys for the men, each of whom had their own defense team, had argued that they suspected Arbery was a burglar in an area that they claimed was "on edge." Arbery was recorded on security camera video visiting a partially built home in the neighborhood several times. The videos did not show him taking anything from the property. The last video was recorded the afternoon he was killed. The defense had sought to convince the jury that the McMichaels and Bryan were trying to execute a citizen's arrest, which was legal at the time in the state.

    But lead prosecutor Dunikoski challenged that narrative. In her closing argument, she said Arbery had not committed an offense in the presence of any of the men and that they decided to "attack" him "because he was a Black man running down the street."

    "Who brought the shotgun to the party?" she said. "You can't create the situation and then go, 'I was defending myself.'"

    Prosecutors did not argue that race motivated the killing but all three face federal hate crime charges.

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nbc.../amp/rcna10901

  8. #28
    Senior Member Frequent Poster Alfred's Avatar
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    I can't begin to understand why Bryan got a life sentence.

    The man filmed a chase, that would eventually end with a murder. Which is something Bryan could not know when he was filming.

    He saw the McMichaels going after someone, and then followed. No bigger plan to take part in a killing whatsoever.

    How on earth can such a thing result in a life sentence??

  9. #29
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    Since he participated in the call with them beforehand, they counted him as an accessory and it's the South so it's the same charge as if he did it. Whole case is a pelt hunt. When D's get elected their sentences will get reduced through criminal justice "reform". Nice to see that a state is giving out LWOP for non-aggravated murders in which we have seen rape murderers get lower sentences.
    "There is a point in the history of a society when it becomes so pathologically soft and tender that among other things it sides even with those who harm it, criminals, and does this quite seriously and honestly. Punishing somehow seems unfair to it, and it is certain that imagining ‘punishment’ and ‘being supposed to punish’ hurts it, arouses fear in it." Friedrich Nietzsche

  10. #30
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    Arbery killers convicted of federal hate crimes in his death

    By Russ Bynum
    AP

    BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — The three white men convicted of murder in Ahmaud Arbery’s shooting were found guilty of federal hate crimes Tuesday in a verdict that affirmed what family members and civil rights activists said all along: that he was chased down and killed because he was Black.

    The verdict — handed down one day before the second anniversary of Arbery’s death on Feb. 23, 2020 — was symbolic, coming just months after all three defendants were convicted of murder in a Georgia state court and sentenced to life in prison.

    But family and community members viewed the hate crimes trial as an important statement. The case also became part of a larger national reckoning on racial injustice after graphic video of Arbery’s killing leaked online.

    “Ahmaud will continue to rest in peace. But he will now begin to rest in power,” Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, told reporters outside the courthouse.

    Arbery’s father, Marcus Arbery Sr., bowed his head and shook his fists in quiet celebration as the guilty verdicts were read in the courtroom. He then pressed his hands together in front of his face as if saying a silent prayer.

    Arbery Sr. and Cooper-Jones emerged from the courthouse holding hands with their attorney Ben Crump, then raised their clasped hands to cheers from supporters.

    But Cooper-Jones did not describe the outcome as a victory.

    “We as a family will never get victory because Ahmaud is gone forever,” she said.

    Arbery Sr. noted that his son used to call every day, even if just to tell his family that he loved them.

    “Ahmaud was a kid you can’t replace, because of the heart he had,” he said. “I’m struggling with that every day,” he said. “It hurts me every day.”

    Defendants Greg and Travis McMichael sat stoically at the defense table as the guilty verdicts were read. When called one-at-a-time before the judge to discuss next steps in their cases, the father and son answered with hushed voices.

    The McMichaels and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, were also found guilty of attempted kidnapping, and the McMichaels were also convicted of the use of a firearm in the commission of a violent crime.

    The trial has been taking place simultaneously with that of three former Minneapolis police officers who have been charged with violating the civil rights of George Floyd. Floyd, a Black man, died on May 25, 2020, when then-officer Derek Chauvin pinned him to the ground and pressed a knee to his neck for what authorities say was 9 1/2 minutes. Attorneys began delivering their closing arguments in that case on Tuesday.

    Weeks prior to the hate crimes trial in the Arbery killing, the McMichaels had both agreed to enter guilty pleas to the hate crimes in exchange for being able to serve their sentences in federal, rather than state prison. Judge Lisa Godbey Wood rejected the deal, however, saying it would tie her hands at sentencing, and after Arbery’s family vehemently opposed it.

    “What we got today, we wouldn’t have gotten if it wasn’t for the fight by the family for Ahmaud,” Cooper-Jones said Tuesday, reiterating her anger at Justice Department prosecutors, who she said “chose to ignore the family’s cry.”

    The facts of the case were not disputed during the hate crimes trial. The McMichaels grabbed guns and jumped in a pickup truck to pursue Arbery after seeing him running in their neighborhood outside the Georgia port city of Brunswick. Bryan joined the pursuit in his own pickup and recorded the cellphone video that later leaked online.

    To back the hate crime charges, prosecutors showed roughly two dozen text messages and social media posts in which Travis McMichael and Bryan used racist slurs and made derogatory comments about Black people. The FBI wasn’t able to access Greg McMichael’s phone because it was encrypted.

    In 2018, Travis McMichael commented on a Facebook video of a Black man playing a prank on a white person: “I’d kill that f----ing n----r.”

    A woman who served under Travis McMichael in the U.S. Coast Guard a decade ago said he called her “n——r lover,” after learning she’d dated a Black man. Another woman testified Greg McMichael had ranted angrily in 2015 when she remarked on the death of civil rights activist Julian Bond, saying, “All those Blacks are nothing but trouble.”

    Crump remarked after the verdict that “for many of us, there was never any doubt that Greg McMichael, Travis McMichael, and William Bryan targeted Ahmaud because of his skin color.”

    “But because of indisputable video evidence, disgusting messages sent by the defendants, and witness testimony, their hate was revealed to the world and the jury,” he said. “We hope and demand that the severity of their crimes are reflected in the sentencing, as well.”

    U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the verdict “makes clear that the Justice Department will continue to use every resource at its disposal to confront unlawful acts of hate and to hold accountable those who perpetrate them.”

    Garland added that Arbery’s family and his friends “should be preparing to celebrate his 28th birthday, later this spring, not mourning the second anniversary of his death tomorrow.”

    “Ahmaud Arbery should be alive today,” he said.

    Defense attorneys contended the McMichaels and Bryan didn’t chase and kill Arbery because of his race but acted on the earnest, though erroneous, suspicion that Arbery had committed crimes in their neighborhood.

    The attorneys for the McMichaels, Amy Lee Copeland and A.J. Balbo, declined to comment on the verdict. Bryan’s attorney, Pete Theodocion, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

    The jury of eight white people, three Black people and one Hispanic person received the case Monday. The jurors adjourned for the night after about three hours of deliberations, and then deliberated for about an hour Tuesday morning before announcing they had reached a verdict.

    https://apnews.com/article/ahmaud-ar...992708cac54eb9

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