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Will They Have Any Chance Of Parole? Sentencing Set For Ahmaud Arbery's Murderers
While father and son Gregory and Travis McMichael along with their neighbor William "Roddie" Bryan will all get life, Judge Timothy R. Walmsley will decide if any of them can be considered for parole in the future.
A sentencing hearing has been set for the three Georgia men who were convicted of killing Ahmaud Arbery.
Gregory McMichael, 65, and his son Travis McMichael, 35, along with their neighbor William "Roddie" Bryan, 52, were all convicted of murder last month in relation to the high profile murder and a judge has now scheduled the trio’s sentencing for Jan. 7, according to an order signed Monday, obtained by First Coast News. Judge Timothy R. Walmsley, who presided over the highly publiclized trial, will decide the fate of the three men in the Glynn County Courthouse that morning.
The two relatives and their neighbor had pursued Arbery, 25, as he ran through their Satilla Shores neighborhood of Brunswick, Georgia, on Feb. 23, 2020 in a pair of pickup trucks. After the men boxed Arbery in, a struggle ensued and Travis McMichael fatally shot him in the chest with a shotgun. Bryan recorded the incident on video.
While all three men were convicted of murder, they were all found guilty of it to varying degrees. The jury found triggerman Travis McMichael guilty on all nine counts he faced, including malice murder, four counts of felony murder, two counts of aggravated assault, and one count each of false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony. Gregory McMichael was not found guilty of malice murder but he was found guilty on four felony murder counts, two counts of aggravated assault, and one count each of false imprisonment and criminal attempt to commit a felony. Bryan was found guilty on three felony murder counts, and one count each of aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and criminal attempt to commit a felony. He was found not guilty of malice murder, one count of felony murder and one count of aggravated assault.
While all men face a minimum of life behind bars, Walmsley will decide whether or not they can be considered for parole in 30 years, First Coast News reports.
The three men were not arrested for the killing until months after it took place when video of the shooting was leaked. The footage sparked outrage across the country in May, the same month that Black Lives Matter protests and unrest erupted in the wake of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis.
The trio's defense claimed that they had the right to pursue Arbery, pointing to the fact that he trespassed briefly at the site of a home under construction. They argued they were trying to effect a citizen's arrest and that Arbery was to blame as the aggressor during the encounter. Prosecutors successfully countered that notion, saying there was no evidence that Arbery was responsible for any crime in the neighborhood and hadn't taken anything from the construction site. The McMichaels and Bryan only gave chase, they told the jury, "because he was a Black man running down their street." Travis allegedly uttered a racial slur after killing Arbery, National Public Radio reported last year.
