BRUNSWICK, Ga. — The three men responsible for Ahmaud Arbery’s murder were found guilty Tuesday morning of federal hate crimes, closing yet another chapter in his family’s two-year struggle for justice.
The verdict was reached just before 10 a.m. after less than four hours of deliberations by a jury of eight white people, three Black people and one Hispanic person. It was also reached the day before the two-year anniversary of Arbery’s slaying.
Several of the jurors were visibly emotional as the clerk read out the guilty verdicts on all five counts of the federal indictment. The foreperson, a Black social worker, wiped tears from his eyes.
Outside the courthouse was a scene of jubilation as Arbery’s parents addressed news cameras. Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, called it “Super Tuesday.”
“I want to say thank you to everybody who stood by us during this fight for justice for Ahmaud,” she said. “It’s been a very long, stressful fight.”
Cooper-Jones praised the Justice Department for bringing the federal hate crimes charges, but she criticized prosecutors for trying to accept a plea deal for two of the defendants late last month against her wishes.
During an emotional pretrial hearing on Jan. 31, U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood, after hearing protests from Arbery’s family, declined to accept a binding plea agreement that would have required her to impose 30-year prison sentences against Travis and Greg McMichael. Wood said she did not know enough about the case and gave the McMichaels two days to decide whether they wanted to enter their guilty pleas but allow her to decide what their ultimate punishment should be. They declined and went to trial.
“What the (Justice Department) did today, it was made to do today,” Cooper-Jones said. “It wasn’t because of what they wanted to do. They were made to do their job today.”
Marcus Arbery, Ahmaud’s father, hugged some of his family members on their way out of the courtroom.
“God is good all the time,” he said in the hallway.
The McMichaels and William "Roddie" Bryan Jr. face possible life sentences for the hate crimes convictions. There is no parole in the federal system. Wood, who presided over the trial, has yet to schedule a sentencing date.
At a news conference in Washington, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said Arbery was “targeted, chased, shot and killed while running on a public street. Today, a jury of the defendants’ peers found unanimously, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendants acted because Mr. Arbery was Black.”
Garland said his heart goes out to Arbery’s parent for the “unimaginable loss” they endured.
“The defendants' actions and the racism that fueled them have inflicted enduring trauma on Mr. Arbery’s family, his friends, his community and communities across the country,” Garland said.
When asked about Cooper-Jones’ criticism of the Justice Department’s recommended plea deal, Garland became emotional, at times catching his breath.
“I cannot imagine that a mother feels to have her son run down and then gunned down while taking a jog on a public street,” he said. “My heart goes out to her and to the family. That’s really all I can say about this.”
In a statement, Gov. Brian Kemp called the verdicts “another necessary step toward justice in a case that shocked many across our state and nation, my family included.”
Arbery, 25, was chased down and shot two years ago in the Satilla Shores subdivision just outside Brunswick after being chased for five minutes by Travis McMichael, his father, Greg, and their neighbor Bryan. All three defendants were convicted of murder at last year’s state trial and sentenced in January to life in prison. Only Bryan, now 52, was given the possibility of parole.
The McMichaels contend they jumped in a pickup truck and chased after Arbery because they suspected him of stealing from a home under construction. Bryan, who lived down the street, joined the chase in his own truck after seeing Arbery run past his house with the father and son in pursuit. He filmed the widely shared cellphone video of Travis McMichael fatally shooting Arbery at close range with his Remington shotgun.
The defendants were convicted of interfering with Arbery’s right to use a public street because of his race as well as attempted kidnapping. The McMichaels were also found guilty of using weapons during a crime of violence.
The convictions are viewed as a victory for the U.S. Justice Department, which has made prosecuting hate crimes a top priority.
Though the punishment in the federal case cannot be much more severe than the sentences given the three defendants in the state case, “symbolically, this verdict is very, very important,” said attorney BJay Pak, the former U.S. attorney in Atlanta.
“Hate crimes statutes carry a message that we will not tolerate this kind of behavior,” Pak said. “Hate crimes convictions are not all that common because it’s not often you have strong evidence of a defendant’s racist intent. In this case, however, the prosecution had powerful evidence of the defendants’ views of Black people.”
The guilty verdicts returned in federal court happened “because of Wanda and because of Marcus,” said civil rights attorney Ben Crump, holding up each of their hands.
Crump said few people doubted the defendants targeted Arbery because of his skin color.
“But because of indisputable video evidence, disgusting messages sent by the defendants and witness testimony, their hate was revealed to the world and the jury,” he said.
As the verdict was read, Travis McMichael bowed his head, closed his eyes and clenched his jaw. Greg McMichael turned to his wife with a sad expression on his face before being led from the second-floor courtroom.
“We’re real disappointed,” said Bryan’s attorney, Pete Theodocion, after the verdicts were reached. “We were optimistic that we would get a good verdict, but we have to respect it and move on.”
Theodocion says he plans to appeal the verdict. He has until two weeks after sentencing to do so.
Civil rights leader Al Sharpton called the hate crimes verdict precedent-setting.
“It sends a signal,” he said. “The fact that this decision occurred in the Deep South shows that you can run but you can’t hide.”
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