Arbery Killers Sentenced to Life Still Face Hate-Crime Trial

(Bloomberg) -- All three White men convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia two years ago will go on trial on federal hate-crime charges Monday after two of them scrapped their last-minute guilty pleas.

The decisions, made in the last 24 hours, assure that a jury will be presented for the first time with evidence of what the U.S. Justice Department alleges was a racist motive for the murder of Arbery, who was Black, by Travis McMichael, his father Gregory McMichael and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan.

FBI special agent Skylar Barnes this week gave a preview of the evidence at a pretrial hearing, saying government investigators found numerous social-media posts by Travis McMichael in which he used racial slurs, including the n-word, and called Black people “savages.”

The three have already been sentenced to life behind bars for murdering Arbery while the 25-year-old jogged through their neighborhood. While allegations of racism were raised a few times during their state trial, it wasn't central to the prosecution's case.

Guilty verdicts in the federal case wouldn't add to their prison time but could offer vindication for those who argued that Arbery's death was symbolic of entrenched racism in the U.S. His murder helped galvanize the Black Lives Matter movement and protests across the country in 2020 after the police killing of George Floyd.

The McMichaels had planned to change their pleas to guilty at a hearing this week, but U.S. District Judge Lisa G. Wood in Brunswick, Georgia, rejected agreements they'd reached with prosecutors. The judge said she didn't want to be bound by the 30-year federal sentences in the deals. She didn't say whether she'd want a longer or shorter term if they're found guilty.

Read More: Arbery Hate-Crimes Trial Nears After Judge Tosses Plea Deal

Arbery's mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, had asked the judge to reject the plea deals. She said the McMichaels are strategically pleading guilty so they can spend the first 30 years of their life sentences in federal prison before going to state prison. 

They were sentenced in the state case to life behind bars with no chance of parole. Bryan was was given an opportunity for parole in 30 years. 

Georgia Superior Court Judge Timothy Walmsley, who oversaw the state court trial, was required by law to sentence the men to life behind bars after a jury found them guilty of murder. When he handed down the sentence, Walmsley said Arbery was “hunted down and shot” in a “chilling, truly disturbing scene.”

“He was killed because individuals here in this courtroom took the law into their own hands,” the judge said.

The case is U.S. v. McMichael, 21-cr-00022, U.S. District Court, Southern District of Georgia (Brunswick).

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