Men Arrested on Murder Charges in Death of Ahmaud Arbery
Written by SOURCE on May 8, 2020
Georgia authorities have arrested two men in the murder investigation of Ahmaud Arbery.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation tells ABC News Gregory McMichael, 64, and his son, Travis McMichael, 34, were taken into custody Thursday and were booked into the Glynn County Jail in Brunswick. The men were each charged with murder and aggravated assault in the Feb. 23 shooting of Arbery, a 25-year-old black man who was killed while jogging in the Satilla Shores neighborhood outside Brunswick.
Gregory McMichael—a former police officer—told authorities he and his son spotted Arbery running in the area and believed he was a suspected burglar. They then grabbed two firearms and followed then man in their truck, before confronting him on the road. A physical altercation ensued and Travis McMichael fatally shot Arbery at least two times. Prosecutors initially declined to charge the father and son, arguing they were acting within the scope of Georgia’s citizens arrest and self-defense statutes. Arbery was unarmed.
Newly surfaced video of the shooting triggered outrage across the nation, prompting calls for the McMichaels’ arrest and justice for Arbery. Shortly after the footage emerged, Atlantic Judicial Circuit District Attorney Tom Durden recommended the case be sent to a grand jury.
“Prosecutors will need a grand jury in order to formally indict these men, but that has nothing to do with actually going out and arresting the men seen on camera murdering a 25-year-old unarmed black man,” the Arbery family’s attorney, Lee Merritt, told ABC News prior to the arrests. “The prosecutors actually have the option, if they so chose to, to directly indictment and skip the entire grand jury process. It’s something that happens all the time in our legal system, and this would certainly be an appropriate moment.”
