Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Lawyers cast slain man as innocent, ‘scary’
BRUNSWICK, Ga. — Prosecutors and defense attorneys Friday presented dueling portraits of Ahmaud Arbery, who was either an innocent Black runner fatally shot by three white strangers or “a scary mystery” who had been seen prowling around a Georgia neighborhood.
In her opening statement, prosecutor Linda Dunikoski said the short cellphone video that stirred national outrage over Arbery’s slaying offered only a glimpse of the attack on the 25-year-old, who gave his pursuers no reason to suspect him of any wrongdoing.
“They assumed that he must have committed some crime that day,” Dunikoski said. “He tried to run around their truck and get way from these strangers, total strangers, who had already told him that they would kill him. And then they killed him.”
A defense attorney for Travis McMichael, the man who shot Arbery three times, put the shooting in a much different light. Attorney Robert Rubin described Arbery to the jury as “an intruder” who had four times been recorded on video “plundering around” a neighboring house under construction.
McMichael and his father, Greg McMichael, gave chase, hoping to detain Arbery until police arrived, Rubin said, but Arbery refused to stop and lunged toward McMichael and his gun.
“It is a horrible, horrible video, and it’s tragic that Ahmaud Arbery lost his life,” Rubin said. “But at that point, Travis McMichael is acting in self-defense. He did not want to encounter Ahmaud Arbery physically. He was only trying to stop him for the police.”
Arbery’s killing on Feb. 23, 2020, was largely ignored until the video leaked and deepened a national reckoning over racial injustice.
On that Sunday afternoon, the McMichaels armed themselves and pursued Arbery in a pickup as he ran through their neighborhood just outside the port city of Brunswick. A neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan, joined the chase and recorded graphic video of Travis McMichael shooting Arbery with a shotgun.
The chase started when a neighbor who’s not charged in the case called a nonemergency police number after seeing Arbery wandering inside a home under construction, where security cameras had recorded him before.
Dunikoski said Greg McMichael later told police that at one point during the chase he shouted at Arbery, “Stop or I’ll blow your f***ing head off!”
When a police officer who responded to the shooting asked Greg McMichael if Arbery had broken into a house, he told the officer: “That’s just it. I don’t know … I don’t know. He might have gone in somebody’s house,” according to Dunikoski.
“All three of these defendants did everything they did based on assumptions — not on facts, not on evidence,” Dunikoski said. “And they made decisions in their driveways based on those assumptions that took a young man’s life.”
As Dunikoski played the video of Arbery’s death for the jury, his mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, cried out and sobbed as her attorney tried to console her.
Rubin described Arbery as a “scary mystery” to residents of a neighborhood on edge from thefts and property crimes. Travis McMichael saw him outside the home construction site at night 11 days before the shooting. When Arbery reached for his pocket, Rubin said, Travis Michael feared he was reaching for a gun.
That’s why the McMichaels grabbed guns before chasing Arbery, Rubin said, insisting they had probable cause to suspect Arbery had been stealing — and therefore could have legally detained him under a Georgia law allowing citizen’s arrests — a law that was repealed by state lawmakers in response to Arbery’s death.
As Arbery ran toward the McMichaels’ truck, as seen on the video, Travis McMichael raised the shotgun in hopes that “he’s going to deescalate the situation,” Rubin said. Instead of running past, Rubin said, Arbery turned toward Travis McMichael “swinging aggressively” with his fists.
Travis McMichael, Rubin said, recalled his firearms training from when he served in the Coast Guard: “Never lose your weapon. And that’s why he shoots.”
“He has no choice, because if this guy gets his gun, he’s dead or his dad’s dead,” Rubin said.
“Greg McMichael was absolutely sure this was the guy, the same guy he had seen on surveillance video inside a house where Greg had sound reasons to believe theft had occurred, burglary,” said Franklin Hogue, his defense attorney.
Hogue said most facts in the trial are not in dispute.
“The why it happened is what this case is about,” Hogue said. “This case is about intent, beliefs, knowledge — reasons for beliefs whether they were true or not.”
Bryan’s attorney, Kevin Gough, deferred making an opening statement until after prosecutors rest their case.
The three defendants are standing trial together, charged with murder and other felonies.
When he was killed, Arbery had no weapon and was carrying no wallet or keys, Dunikoski said.
Arbery “couldn’t even have called for help if he wanted to,” she said.