Ahmaud Arbery killers’ hate crime trial goes to jury

A predominantly white jury on Monday began deliberating federal hate crime charges against the three men convicted of killing Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man who was murdered while out jogging in February 2020. 

Following closing arguments, Judge Lisa Wood sent the jury out to deliberate whether the three men were motivated by race when they killed Arbery in a Brunswick, Ga., neighborhood, according to Reuters. 

The defendants — Travis McMichael; his father, Gregory McMichael; and their neighbor William “Roddie” Bryan — have all already been convicted on multiple counts of murder for their parts in Arbery’s killing. 

All three of them were sentenced to life in prison last month. The McMichaels both face life in prison without parole.

They have all pleaded not guilty to the federal hate crime charges they face.

“They were motivated by racial assumption, racial resentment and racial anger,” Christopher Perras, a special litigator for the Justice Department’s civil rights division, said of the defendants in his closing argument on Monday, Reuters reported.

Lawyers for the defendants argued that the three white men were motivated by Arbery’s behavior, not his race. 

“If you ask, ‘Would these defendants have grabbed guns and done this to a white guy?’ and the answer is yes,” argued Amy Lee Copeland, an attorney for Travis McMichael, according to the news service.

During the case, the prosecution presented evidence of a history of bigotry, including using racial slurs online and in their personal lives.

Specifically, the prosecution pointed to Travis McMichael’s social media posts in which he called Black people “monkeys” and “subhuman savages” and to Bryan used a racial slur in an online post after he found out his daughter was dating a Black man.