Georgia prosecutor wants to bring shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery to grand jury: ‘This is murder’

Gregory McMichael
Gregory McMichael

A Georgia prosecutor stated Tuesday that he needs a fabulous jury to choose if criminal allegations are justified in the passing of a man shot after an interest by outfitted men who later told police they associated him with being a thief.

Ahmaud Arbery, 25, was murdered Feb. 23 out of an area outside the seaside port city of Brunswick. Nobody has been charged or arrested for the situation, inciting a clamor from the nearby NAACP and others. Arbery was dark and the men who chased him are white.

“All I want to do is get justice for my son,” stated Marcus Arbery, the slain man’s father, who believes his son was out jogging when he was killed. “This is terrible. It could happen to anybody’s kid.”

The declaration that a grand jury will survey the case came as a lawyer for Arbery’s mom posted a cellphone video on Twitter that he claimed shows the shooting.

“This is murder,” lawyer Lee Merritt said.

“Mr. Arbery had not committed any crime and there was no reason for these men to believe they had the right to stop him with weapons or to use deadly force in furtherance of their unlawful attempted stop,” stated Merritt, who is a representative of Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper.

Tom Durden, an outside examiner relegated to look at the case, stated he intends to have a grand jury hear the proof in the shooting. That won’t occur for over a month, as Georgia courts remain to a great extent shut as a result of the coronavirus until June 13.

“I am of the opinion that the case should be presented to the grand jury of Glynn County for consideration of criminal charges against those involved in the death of Mr. Arbery,” Durden stated Tuesday.

Durden stated by phone that no one has been arrested related to the shooting. He declined to say what charges he might have a grand jury consider.

The cellphone video, at first posted by a Brunswick radio broadcast, shows a dark man running at a running pace on the left half of a two-path street. A truck is left in the street in front of him, with one man in the pickup bed and another remaining next to the open driver’s side entryway.

The sprinter goes across the street to pass the pickup on the traveler side, at that point crosses back before the truck. A gunfire sounds and the video shows the sprinter thinking about a man in the road over what gives off an impression of being a shotgun or rifle. A subsequent shot can be heard and the sprinter can be seen punching the man. A third shot is shot at point-empty shell run. The sprinter amazes a couple of feet and falls face down.

“I think the video is very clear that they were on the truck with guns hunting him down,” stated Benjamin Crump, a lawyer for Arbery’s father. “I don’t know what more you need to make an arrest.”

Durden refused to comment Tuesday when the investigator was asked if he could prove that the video showed the shooting of Arbery.

As indicated by a report of the incident filed by Glynn County police, Arbery was shot Feb. 23 after two men seen him running in their neighborhood and protected themselves with firearms before getting in a truck to seek after him. Gregory McMichael told police that he and his man thought the young man coordinated somebody got on a camera submitting a break-in in the area.

As indicated by his dad, Arbery didn’t live a long way from the Satilla Shores neighborhood where the McMichaels gave pursue spotting him on a Sunday afternoon.

The police report says Gregory McMichael told officials he and his child originally attempted to stop Arbery by yelling, “Stop, stop, we want to talk to you!”

McMichael stated his child escaped the truck and the Arbery “began to violently attack” him and “the two men then started fighting over the shotgun,” the police report stated.

The police report says Gregory McMichael turned Arbery onto his back to check whether he was outfitted. However, the report doesn’t state whether he had a weapon or not.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based social equality gathering, has requested the U.S. Equity Department examine.

A telephone number recorded for Gregory McMichael has been detached. The Associated Press couldn’t promptly discover a telephone posting for Travis McMichael.

Jackie Johnson, the head prosecutor for Glynn County, recused herself from the case since Gregory McMichael functioned as an agent in her office. He resigned a year before.

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