3 whites guilty of murdering black jogger
THE three men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery last year as he was jogging in a Brunswick, Georgia, neighbourhood were found guilty of felony murder, offering a semblance of closure for Arbery’s family and supporters, who have been calling for justice for more than a year.
Addressing the crowd outside the courthouse, Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, spoke of the family’s struggle to get any kind of justice.
“It’s been a long fight. It’s been a hard fight. But God is good,” she said. “Back in 2020, I never thought this day would come.” Her son could now rest in peace, she said.
Lawyers for convicted defendant Greg McMichael were disappointed by the verdict.
Laura Hogue told Leigh McMichael, Greg’s wife, that she was “floored with a capital ‘F’.”
Travis McMichael was convicted of murder alongside his father. His attorney Jason Sheffield said the three men “truly believe they were doing the
right thing to protect their neighbours and friends.”
“We thought the jury would see that the state had it wrong, but they made an everlasting decision and we respect the time and integrity that they brought to the process,” Sheffield said.
The McMichaels’s attorneys vowed to appeal.
William “Roddie” Bryan, the McMichaels’s neighbour, was also convicted of murder. Kevin Gough, his attorney, criticised the verdict, but “that is the American way”.
“We may disagree as to whether we were successful in getting them a fair trial, but we certainly respect the efforts that were made,” Gough said.
He said he will seek a new trial.
John Perry, senior pastor of Mount Sinai Missionary Baptist Church, hailed the verdict as proof that the courts can still deliver justice for African Americans.
“As a community leader, I’ve been encouraging people to do it the right way and trust that the system will prevail,” said Perry. “And so to hear the guilty verdicts literally brought tears to my eyes. Our system isn’t perfect, it’s in need of a lot of tweaking, but this proves that it’s not totally broken.”
Perry added that the verdict had helped restore his faith in his white neighbours.
“We were shaken by only having one black juror,” Perry said. | The