The shooting of Ahmaud Arbery in Satilla Shores, Georgia looks like the sort of story that would draw national attention in another time. Two white guys grab their guns, hop in their pickup truck and chase down a 25 yr old black man running through the neighborhood. A confrontation, a scuffle over a shotgun, shots fired and.... the black man is dead and the white guy is claiming self-defense. Come on, man.
Add to the mix that the two white guys were father and son. The son hopped out of the truck and had the fatal showdown. The dad was a former investigator for the local DA (now recused) and before that a local police officer. Hard to believe the local law enforcement community is pressing hard for an arrest and conviction.
So, what was the probable cause that sparked the pursuit? Previous break-ins in the area and this:
When retired district attorney investigator Greg McMichael saw a man he suspected of burglary sprinting down Satilla Drive on the afternoon of Feb. 23, he alerted his adult son and both men grabbed their guns, according to a Glynn County police report.
An adrenaline-infused pursuit ensued, which ended a block away when Travis McMichael’s shotgun fired twice as he and the man struggled for possession of it, Greg McMichael told police. Ahmaud Marquez Arbery, 25, died on the spot, “bleeding out” in a matter of minutes, the police report said.
...
The McMichael men and others were fed up with burglaries and auto break-ins by the time that fateful February afternoon unfolded, the police report indicated. The senior McMichael told police the surveillance video in the neighborhood had earlier captured Arbery in suspicious circumstances. McMichael told police they saw Arbery “the other night” and that he reached in his pants, as if readying to draw a gun, the report said
Sometime around 1 p.m., McMichael was in his son’s front yard at 230 Satilla Drive when he saw Arbery running down the street, the report said. McMichael dashed inside the house and called to his son. “’Travis, the guy is running down the street, lets go,’” he told police. McMichael grabbed a .357 magnum handgun and Travis grabbed his shotgun, “not knowing if the male was armed or not,” the report said. Then they ran back outside and hopped in a truck, the report said.
The "reached in his pants" reeks of cop bullshit. As to whether they could have IDed Arbery from earlier neighborhood surveillance, well, the DA with the case has some videotapes. Back to the story, and then some potentially exculpatory stuff from the Times.
Travis McMichael drove down Satilla Drive toward the intersection of Buford Road, the report said. They spotted Arbery running down Buford Road. Travis drove down Burford Road and tried unsuccessfully to cut off Arbery’s escape with the truck, the report said.
The Brunswick man then turned and started “running back in the direction from which he came,” the report said. Travis McMichael again tried without success to cut Arbery off with the truck.
Greg McMichael jumped into the truck’s bed at this point and the pursuit resumed. At one point in the pursuit, the two McMichaels hailed, “’Stop, stop, we want to talk to you,’” the report said.
Travis McMichael pulled up beside Arbery and again made it known they wanted to talk, the report said. At this point, Travis McMichael exited the vehicle, shotgun in hand.
“McMichael stated he saw (Arbery) begin to “violently attack Travis and the two men then started fighting over the shotgun, at which point Travis fired a shot and then a second later there was a second shot,” the report stated. “McMichael stated the male fell face down on the pavement with his hand under his body.”
McMichael then searched Arbery for a gun, the report said.
“McMichael stated he rolled the man over to see if the male had a weapon,” the report said. “I observed blood on McMichael’s hands from rolling (Arbery) over.”
The county police report ends without stating whether Arbery was in possession of a gun. Attempts by The News to contact Barnhill Wednesday were unsuccessful.
Arbery was arrested in December of 2012 by Glynn County Schools Police for bringing a handgun into the Brunswick High gymnasium during a basketball game. When an officer spotted the .380 caliber handgun in his waistband, the then 19-year-old Arbery attempted to flee.
Hmm, if he was 19 in Dec of 2012 he should be 26 or 27 today. Paper says 25. Moving on, back to the Times:
But others contend that Mr. Arbery was up to no good. On the day of the shooting, and apparently moments before the chase, a neighbor in Satilla Shores called 911, telling the dispatcher that a black man in a white T-shirt was inside a house that was under construction and only partially closed in.
“And he’s running right now,” the man told the dispatcher. “There he goes right now!”
Well. Apparently there is video of the home burglary that day AND the fatal confrontation.
Mr. Barnhill also wrote that he did not believe there was evidence of a crime, noting that Gregory McMichael and his son had been legally carrying their weapons under Georgia law. And because Mr. Arbery was a “burglary suspect,” the pursuers, who had “solid firsthand probable cause,” were justified in chasing him under the state’s citizen’s arrest law.
In a separate document, Mr. Barnhill stated that video exists of Mr. Arbery “burglarizing a home immediately preceding the chase and confrontation.” In the letter to the police, he cites a separate video of the shooting filmed by a third pursuer.
Mr. Barnhill said this video, which has not been made public, shows Mr. Arbery attacking Travis McMichael after he and his father pulled up to him in their truck.
The video shows Mr. Arbery trying to grab the shotgun from Travis McMichael’s hands, Mr. Barnhill wrote. And that, he argued, amounts to self-defense under Georgia law. Travis McMichael, Mr. Barnhill concluded, “was allowed to use deadly force to protect himself.”
He noted that it was possible that Mr. Arbery had caused the gun to go off by pulling on it, and pointed to Mr. Arbery’s “mental health records” and prior convictions, which, he said, “help explain his apparent aggressive nature and his possible thought pattern to attack an armed man.”
Our long national nightmare has resumed. Probable cause and self-defense let you chase a guy down, jump out of a truck and start waving a shotgun? That's a Grand Canyon between "legal" and "common-sensical".
Social distancing has made the usual protests difficult. But now the NY Times is featuring it and since the case is from Georgia, I expect Stacy Abrams to leverage this into her campaign for the Vice Presidential nod. Definitely murkier than Trayvon Martin or Michael Brown, since those were only murky to folks who were relying on emotion and pre-disposition.
How long until these tapes go public?
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