Ahmaud Arbery Killers Convicted in Federal Civil-Rights Trial

T hree Georgia men already facing life sentences after their state-court convictions for murdering Ahmaud Arbery have been convicted in federal court on civil-rights charges.

As I’ve previously noted, two of the men — the father-and-son tandem of Gregory and Travis McMichael, who were the most culpable killers — had reached guilty-plea agreements with the Justice Department the week before the trial was scheduled to begin. Those agreements were rejected, however, by federal district judge Lisa Godbey Wood, at the passionate behest of the Arbery family. The family objected because the agreement would have provided real benefit only to the murderers: Rather than serve their sentence in a Georgia state prison, which is generally deemed to be more difficult time, they would have been permitted to serve their sentences in federal prison.

In essence, the Justice Department has convicted the McMichaels and the third defendant, their neighbor William “Roddie” Bryan, for being racists. There was no evidence that the three white men used any racial epithets against Arbery, a 26-year-old black man. There was no evidence that they used violence against other black people, or that they randomly attacked Arbery because of his race.

On that score, the evidence was — as it was at the state murder trial — that the McMichaels suspected Arbery of robbing a neighborhood construction site where a home was being built. In fact, a dozen days before the shooting, Travis McMichael called 911 to complain that he had seen Arbery in the vicinity of the construction site and believed he might be armed. On the day the three men joined in the fatal chase that led to Arbery’s shooting by Travis McMichael, Gregory McMichael observed Arbery running in the vicinity of the site and called 911 while the chase was on. It is hard to believe that even men as ignorant as the accused would call the police to draw attention to their pursuit of Arbery if their reason for chasing him was his skin color.

Race was not a factor in the state trial. Prosecutors did not bring it up, much less urge it as the motive. The men were convicted of murder because, while they suspected Arbery of theft, they lacked probable cause that he had stolen anything from the site. Ergo, their detention of Arbery was an unlawful kidnapping and the shooting (when the unarmed Arbery charged at the younger McMichael) was a knowing use of excessive force.

In the federal trial, the prosecutors had no direct evidence that racism motivated the defendants to chase, detain, and kill Arbery. Yet, they had significant evidence that the three men had a history of making repugnant statements exhibiting hostility toward black people.

Bryan, for example, opposed his daughter’s dating a black man. While in the Coast Guard, Travis McMichael ridiculed a white subordinate, Kristie Ronquielle, for dating a black man (Ms. Ronquille testified that he called her an “N-word lover”). Gregory McMichael laughingly told an acquaintance that when one of his tenants, a black woman, fell into arrears, he cut off her air-conditioning and then “her big fat black ass” quickly came up with the rent money — an ugly story . . . though, as his counsel pointed out, one that indicated McMichael’s despicable views did not dissuade him from renting to black people, so it’s quite the leap to assume they induced him to kill a black person.

The Justice Department prosecutors shrewdly interspersed accounts about these exhibitions of racial animus against other black people with details of the chase and shooting of Arbery. This obvious tugging on the jury’s emotions was blatant. As even the New York Times, which has been very sympathetic to the prosecution, puts it in today’s report on the verdict:

The government introduced no evidence to show that the men directed their racist language toward Mr. Arbery specifically. But prosecutors noted that some of the racist language had been used a few days or months before the killing. They also seemed to bet on the jury being revolted by how much evidence of racism there was, with the quantity of insults showing that these were more than accidental slips of the tongue.

It worked. As the Times further notes:

[T]he government’s case seemed to take an emotional toll on jurors, some of whom could be seen crying. Last week, one of the jurors asked court officials if counseling was available.

The charge in the case was not murder. Technically, the men were charged with depriving Arbery of his civil rights due to racial prejudice, along with kidnapping and the McMichaels’ use and brandishing of firearms during violent crimes. In essence, though, the case was framed for the jury of twelve people — one Hispanic, three black, and eight white — as if a vote to acquit would be seen as a vote in favor of racism.

In the trial, which took just a week, the jury began deliberating yesterday afternoon. They had a verdict, convicting on all counts, by this morning.

I am as repulsed as anyone by racism. I am glad that it has become an unacceptable attitude in our society. I do not believe, however, that the government’s prosecutorial power should be brought to bear against reprehensible beliefs. I am convinced that is what happened here. In the state prosecution, three men were convicted of murder, as they should have been. In the federal prosecution, three men were convicted of being racists while they committed their crimes, and prosecutors dared the jurors to notice that the government did not prove a causal connection between the reprehensible attitude and the reprehensible acts.

We can stigmatize noxious beliefs. It is dangerous that we now use government power to criminalize them. I continue to fear that we will rue this development.