Verdicts of GUILTY in the Arbery case
The verdicts are as follows: Travis McMichael (who actually shot Arbery) guilty on all counts, including malice murder, and the rest are guilty of various types of felony murder. You can read the details at the link.
As I’ve written before, I’ve not followed this case closely enough to have a truly informed opinion about most aspects of it. My sense – mostly from reading two or three long articles – is that this was a situation in which the defendants were trying to make a citizen’s arrest under a law that has now been repealed as a consequence of this incident, and they were arguably violating a number of the requirements of a citizen’s arrest. For example, they had not personally witnessed Arbery committing the crime of which they believed him guilty. They were armed with a long gun, which he ultimately tried to grab from them, but he may indeed have had plenty of reason to think they were the ones threatening his life.
That said, apparently the judge’s instructions to the jury on the required elements of a citizen’s arrest under the statute were extremely restrictive and essentially meant that as a matter of law the defendants were not complying. Once that was established as the law per the judge’s instructions, the jury had almost no recourse but to decide that the defendants were in the act of committing a felony against Arbery, and therefore the felony murder convictions would almost certainly follow.
At least, that’s my understanding at this point, subject to revision. As I’ve said, I’m not at all up to speed on this case and therefore anything I say about it is very provisional. I will add, however, that many decades ago when I was in law school and first heard of felony murder, it was a law that troubled me. I’m still troubled by it. I know the reason behind it, but it still seems to me to be a mechanism by which it’s easy to put someone away for very lengthy periods of time who is not guilty of anything a layperson would usually call “murder.” This may be the case with the third defendant here, William “Ryan” Bryan, who was nowhere near as involved as the others.
Another description of the case and the verdicts can be found here.
I’ve left out the racial aspects of the case, which were certainly operating for the public because Arbery was black and the defendants are all white. This definitely mattered in the court of public opinion – and certainly for the MSM, who portrayed Arbery as a recreational jogger, which he was not. But whether race mattered in the actual court in terms of the jury’s deliberations, I don’t know. It seems to me that the judge’s instructions on citizen’s arrest are what effectively determined the outcome.
I also have no opinion as to whether this was the correct verdict or not, although as I said before I have my doubts about Bryan’s guilt of the most serious charges of which he was convicted, which rests on the application of the felony murder doctrine (you can read up on felony murder here and here).
“For example, they had not personally witnessed Arbery committing the crime of which they believed him guilty.”
No law-talking-guy here but that seems like the whole case. If the concept of citizen’s arrest extends to “Hey! That guy MIGHT have done something!” then what’s the difference between that and completely lawless vigilantism?
Mike
MBunge:
It’s much more complicated than that. I’m doing this from memory of a post by Branca, but Arbery had been videoed at the scene of multiple robberies at that site in the past, at night (when the robberies had occurred). They knew him from these videos, and had also confronted him previously and he had reached for his waistband so they thought he was armed. The police had previously been unresponsive. There had been a huge increase in thefts and burglaries in the neighborhood and also some home invasions. So they felt they had probable cause to make a citizen’s arrest, and the statute is somewhat vague about the elements of a citizen’s arrest and there is some indication that probable cause would be enough although the judge did not think so.
It’s not as cut and dried as it seems, although there’s no question in my mind that what they did in trying to make this arrest themselves in the manner they employed was very ill-advised and a recipe for disaster.
Although I’m in Neo’s boat of ignorance on this case’s details, a quick perusal of the top 459 comments at Instaoundit refutes the second part beginning “he may have”: “They were armed with a long gun, which he ultimately tried to grab from them, but he may indeed have had plenty of reason to think they were the ones threatening his life.”
Or was Aubrey aggressive because his guilty conscience told him that wrestling an armed man was his best bet against three men?
Apparently, the trio had previously recognized Aubrey as the same man on surveillance video footage of a housing site they’d worked on several times.
But this didn’t matter to LEO.
THUS, like Rittenhouse, these brave men manned up and are unjustly found guilty.
Three parts of an appeal will likely get decision reversed and a new trial where there will be found innocent.
At least that’s the story I’ve gleaned from Insta comments.
This also seems another travesty brought to you by Soros Utopian Justice Mob, responsible for defending police and grievously countermanding local laws because RACISM!
SAME SHYTE, different week.
“there’s no question in my mind that what they did in trying to make this arrest themselves in the manner they employed was very ill-advised and a recipe for disaster.”
But that’s kind of the point. When you pull out a gun, you’re not just taking the lives of others in your hands, you’re taking your OWN life in your hands.
These men were not police officers. They were not trained in law enforcement or the law. They were not in a situation where they or others were in danger. They had no personal knowledge or actual evidence of Aubrey doing anything criminal.
Maybe they shouldn’t have been convicted of murder, but there’s no way this sort of behavior should just be winked at or tolerated.
Mike
Branca and Posobiec are scheduled to be on TimcastIRL tonight, where they’ll probably review the Arbery verdict as well as the Waukesha massacre.
Probable (i.e. burglarized area, outsider presence), perhaps plausible cause (a la Capitol Hill “hero”), pursuit with intent to arrest, withdrawal, pursuit, shot and killed in the midst of assault.
See something, say something, do something in a climate of social justice and denying civil and human rights (e.g. diversity [dogma], political congruence, Pro-Choice religion)… a progressive path and grade.
Neo, according to what I read, Arbery had been seen in the security videos at the construction site several times, but had never been seen taking anything from the site. A police officer testified that he had been unable to identify Arbery, but if he had, and had charged him, it would have been for trespass, a misdemeanor.
Kate:
I know. He may or may not have been burglarizing the neighborhood, but the grounds for a citizen’s arrest were very shaky indeed.
It’s distressing to see people on Neo’s site, and Neom herself, not understanding the background of what went down. It didn’t happen in a vacuum. The neighborhood had become a place where crime was increasing and the police were doing little or nothing. People were trying to fight back by putting up cameras, noting strangers in the neighborhood, copying down license numbers of strange cars, and calling 9/11 (to little avail). Incidentally, Arberry was a burglar who had been convicted of felony gun possession and theft of a TV.
For more on that, see this:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/10/ahmaud-arbery-case-seven-facts-the-jury-will-probably-never-hear/
Yet, this case has been portrayed
Arberry had been photographed in the under-construction home where things were being stolen. The Mcmichaels were aware of this. They called 9/11 and set out to detain Arberry. Was it a bad idea? Probably. They were two southern white bubbas. In today’s racial turmoil, they certainly would not be seen as “good guys.” Their neighbor, who they hardly knew, got involved on a desire to help – be a good neighbor and all that.
The McMichaels (father and son) certainly didn’t set out to shoot Arberry, but because of a previous encounter with him, they felt he might be armed. So, the son grabbed a shotgun. Bad move.
They tried to detain Arberry until the police arrived. Had Arberry complied he would have been arrested because he was in violation of his probation on the stolen TV charge. Thus, he was desperate to get away. He did a desperate thing, trying to wrest the gun away from the younger McMichael. What would Arberry have done had he gotten control of the gun? No one knows. Maybe he would have just run away. Maybe he would have gunned down the men closest to him and then run away. There are other possibilities, but the younger McMichael surely felt fear for bodily injury or worse when Arberry attacked him.
Had he not tried to wrest the gun away, he would still be alive. A lot of things went wrong. And it would be possible to say the three southern white bubbas were wrong to try to detain Arberry. But then, you could go further back and say that had Arberry not gone to a house that was being watched for burglars, none of this would have happened. So, who is really at fault? Solomon, anyone?
At the most I think the verdict should have been manslaughter. and felony assault. But I’m no legal expert.
We have a growing problem in this country. Prosecutors who won’t prosecute property criminals, which ties the police’s hands in arresting and charging them. As a result, neighborhoods become dangerous and the citizens want to protect themselves because the government won’t. It’s a bad scene and getting worse.
@ J J > “We have a growing problem in this country. Prosecutors who won’t prosecute property criminals, which ties the police’s hands in arresting and charging them. As a result, neighborhoods become dangerous and the citizens want to protect themselves because the government won’t. It’s a bad scene and getting worse.”
It’s becoming quite obvious that this is a plan, not an unanticipated consequence.
Kyle Rittenhouse’s acquittal (which will never be repeated for anyone who does not have the same quantity of unimpeachable evidence in his favor) was a minor speed-bump to the desired result: citizens with no government (or private) protection and no right of self-defense.
The law continues to uphold the principle that Blacks may predate Whites at their leisure and if you do anything about it, you will be calumnised and then disposed of as garbage.
Occasionally the System will allow a White to engage in self-defence against another White so that the Eloi will remain content and peaceful while they’re being harvested.
No way are any of those three men guilty of murder.
However, they are all guilty of being white.
Once Arbery grabbed that rifle, his death was on him.
At most, Travis McMichael and possibly the other two, should have been charged and convicted of involuntary manslaughter.
This verdict, unless over turned on appeal, will complete what was started, but stuttered, in the Zimmerman case. The left views all private gun ownership as a blight and CCW as the plague.
If you think/believe you will go to prison if you use your firearm in self defense what use is a CCW? There are more ways than one to disarm people and the MSM will tout this verdict to get people into the “proper” mindset. Law, facts, reason, be damned.
J.J.:
I explained some of that already, and linked to a post by Branca that explained the rest of the background. The links are important to read if you want to know what I understand or don’t understand.
The legal question has to do with whether what they did came under the citizen’s arrest law in Georgia. If it didn’t, it becomes a felony and felony murder kicks in.
As I said, felony murder laws are in my opinion a big problem, and I’ve been of that opinion for most of my adult life.
Yup. AesopFan has our future in his sights, writing “ was a minor speed-bump to the desired result: citizens with no government (or private) protection and no right of self-defense.”
Eithe the hostile pushback and absolute rejection of Soros prog prosecutors becomes a tsunami…. Or else people will be happy to live in Hell because RACISM!
Yup. AesopFan has our future in his sights, writing “ was a minor speed-bump to the desired result: citizens with no government (or private) protection and no right of self-defense.”
Either the hostile pushback and absolute rejection of Soros prog prosecutors becomes a tsunami…. Or else people will be happy to live in Hell because RACISM!
Geoff: “If you think/believe you will go to prison if you use your firearm in self defense what use is a CCW? There are more ways than one to disarm people….”
BY DESIGN…from the “law” school indoctrination centres.
MORE on Soros prog prosecutors
https://victorygirlsblog.com/george-soros-has-funded-district-attorneys-across-the-country-and-the-blood-and-treasure-on-his-hands/
This case seems more like a Rorschach test, especially if you only know part of the facts. It has elements of Rittenhouse while also missing key elements.
The initial issue is lack of government policing, just like Rittenhouse. There is no evidence moments before of a felony crime, as there was in Rittenhouse. Rittenhouse was interested in putting out the fire, not in arresting Rosenbaum. The McMichaels desire to arrest created a provocation. Rosenbaum and Arbery both reached for the long firearm. Rittenhouse was outnumbered, but it was Arbery who was outnumbered.
I feel for the defendants, but as I read the law, I think they failed to meet the first paragraph and needed to meet it. That mistake makes me think guilty is a reasonable verdict. Reasonable is important to me going back to the Rorschach, because I have reasonable doubt that Arbery committed a felony (he no doubt trespassed and had no business to be there).
I hope the lack of policing plays into sentencing in the defendants favor.
“The legal question has to do with whether what they did came under the citizen’s arrest law in Georgia. If it didn’t, it becomes a felony and felony murder kicks in.” neo
Respectfully, no it doesn’t. As soon as Arbery grabbed McMichael’s gun, it changed the dynamics. Since in the struggle, McMichael pulled the trigger, (quite possibly accidentally) the proper charge is involuntary manslaughter. That Georgia law may necessitate a charge of felony murder is given the circumstances, cruel and unusual punishment. At most, the father and neighbor should face accessory to involuntary manslaughter.
But the truth is that the world is better off without Arbery in it. As, through his repeated criminality he had revealed himself to be an enemy of civilization. Far past time to stop dancing around the 800lb gorilla in the room. Those who act like rabid dogs, are rabid dogs.
“Disturbing new video released by the NYPD shows callous thieves yanking a man from his wheelchair and robbing him in the Bronx.”
https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/nyc-crime/ny-man-in-wheelchair-beaten-robbed-bronx-video-20211123-6ffnpnafgjauxf43uph4qzsaua-story.html
An 82-year-old man driving through Boston was surrounded and attacked last week by a mob of 30 to 40 dirt bike and ATV riders
https://news.yahoo.com/massachusetts-man-82-attacked-boston-230352853.html
From the Alternate History Flying Cars and Moon Bases Universe:
Jetson ONE – Flying Through The Forest
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSCvsW-z2LE
Just the thing your Neighbourhood Watch needs to round up straying Joggers.
Now if they’d hired Johnnie Cochran and his patented Chewbacca Defense it might have turned out different.
The Chewbacca Defense is Used in Court – SOUTH PARK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aV6NoNkDGsU
MBunge:
I do agree they should have been convicted of something, but not murder. I’m not sure what, though, because once you convict them of a felony then the felony murder rule kicks in.
Zaphod:
You have no idea what you’re talking about, as is so often the case (I’m referring to this comment of yours on this thread. The law upholds nothing of the sort. In this case, pretrial publicity was racial in nature, and the MSM lied about quite a few elements of the crime in order to make Arbery even more innocent-seeming. But the law is the way this was decided. The law of citizen’s arrest in Georgia does not support what these people did, and as I’ve explained, if what they did is a felony then felony murder kicks in. I don’t agree with the felony murder laws, but I can tell you that white people and black people have certainly been punished by them.
I realize that you are on your favorite race-reductionist hobby horse, and that the logic of what I say has no meaning to you.
In Texas I have the right per our state laws to defend other people’s property to the point of lethal force, ie killling someone.
Thing is, as this brought out, is it worth it?
Do you really want to go through a grand jury indictment (ham sandwich) and then a possible trial over someone else’s property?
Worse, this has no appearance of anything resembling protecting other people’s property.
geoffb, Geoffrey Britain, J.J.,, et al:
No, this is not analogous at all to Rittenhouse and it doesn’t even have much to do with self-defense in general or the right to carry a gun in general. Using a gun in the course of making a supposed citizen’s arrest when you have not seen the crime in progress (and the crime is not life-threatening nor does it involve your own home) is not just carrying a gun for self-defense nor is it intervening in a crime. And it’s certainly not protecting one’s own home or family with a gun
Then if you add on top of it a felony murder law – and a lot of people seem not to have followed the link because they don’t seem to understand felony murder – you can’t just charge and convict them with something less than murder. Once they have committed any dangerous felony, then any death that occurred in the course of that activity constitutes murder on their part. Read up on felony murder in those links at the end of my post.
As I’ve said, I don’t like the felony murder laws and haven’t since I first learned about them in law school. But that’s the operating law here, to the best of my understanding so far.
Neo, I went a bit hyperbolic in asserting that you seemed unaware of the background to the case. You probably know more than most people and with your intense researching will certainly know much more than I do.
Aesopfan is correct. “It’s becoming quite obvious that this is a plan, not an unanticipated consequence.”
The goal is to make it so no one can use a personal firearm for defense of their homes and neighborhoods. You can legally own the gun, but don’t you dare use it. It’s apparent that the Democrats have gamed this all out.
Also, the campaign to devalue private property. Private property rights enforced by courts are the bedrock of our economic system. These are being targeted by the Democrats. Exorbitant limits on how much you can shoplift before you are charged is one method. We have people in the Puget Sound area who are moving into vacant homes that are for sale. They claim they aren’t citizens of the U.S. and aren’t bound by our property laws. How long before lefty DAs begin to assert that “It’s only property – no big deal, let them have it?” Very devious and turning things upside down.
J.J.:
I completely agree that the left (which now includes the Democrats) are out to ban guns and self-defense. I also agree that the relative inaction on the part of the police is a plan of the left’s. No disagreement on that.
The Rittenhouse case was absolutely about self-defense. The McClosky case also was about that. This case is not about self-defense. This is about how far people can go to make a citizen’s arrest with a gun, for a property crime they have not personally witnessed and does not even involve their own property. That’s a big difference.
There will be plenty of other cases in which the left is trying to take guns away and end self-defense. This is not one of them.
To me it does seem like a self-defense case. If Arbery hadn’t grabbed for the gun, and they’d simply shot him, perhaps to keep him from running away, it would have looked like a straight-up execution, nothing we’d be arguing about. The only thing that makes the case difficult is the defendant’s argument that he had to shoot to protect himself when Arbery grabbed his fun. After that, it becomes an argument over whether the defendants provoked the fight. I’m speaking now from the point of view of the public’s view of the policy involved. Framing it technically as a felony murder does confuse things–but even in a felony murder case, if the only reason someone got hurt or killed is that the defendant had to protect himself against a dangerous attack, isn’t that a defense?
Neo, I understand felony murder and did not compare this to Rittenhouse but to Zimmerman as a case for going after private citizens protecting their neighborhoods. I also read the piece at LI you linked and I agree with it that the judge made an error that caused this verdict to be a certainty.
What I am saying is that if people sense that any self defense with a firearm will land them in jeopardy of huge legal bills and a likely prison term then they will self disarm. And that is what the purpose is of these prosecutors and the selective media reporting on crimes.
Everybody gets to hear about Arbery, Floyd, Blake etc. Riots happen over them and the police are stood-down to give the left’s thugs “room to destroy.” Do they know about Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian? No that wouldn’t have advanced the narrative for power.
“What I am saying is that if people sense that any self defense with a firearm will land them in jeopardy of huge legal bills and a likely prison term then they will self disarm.”
Sure, that’s possible.
The other possibility is full-on vigilantism. Keep your eyes peeled for cryptic references to the 3 S’s: “shoot, shovel, shut up”. I guess I’ve led a quiet life but this was new to me. Yet, seen regularly now.
Not everyone will self disarm.
Not everyone will wring their hands. Especially as knowledge spreads about what faces those unable to protect themselves.
Vigilantism is bad, but it’s a step up from chaotic lawlessness.
As law prof Glenn Reynolds (InstaPundit) says, police are important in the protection of the rights of the accused. Vigilanties don’t have the time, training or motivation to give fair trials.
What we’re seeing now is the Left trying mightily to change the narrative away from the clear cut Kyle victory. Activists, gov’t, MSM and the Dem Party are working tirelessly to reverse the message, muddy the waters.
geoffb, I thought today about Christopher and Channon as well. Horrifying and enough to steel your resolve to do the right thing, not the lawful thing.
It really doesn’t matter about the details of Arbery’s history or his criminal record, or even mens rea. The McMichaels did not witness Arbery commit a felony, or have immediate knowledge of one. Also, the gentlemen themselves were the first to produce firearms and escalate the scenario, when Arbery was only attempting to flee. You can’t plead self-defense when you escalate the situation to create the attack, and Arbery was never attempting to execute a forceable felony (the only other defense against a force usage). Bryan has even less of a defense, because he basically just jumped in when he saw his friends acting.
The McMichaels were committing attempted kidnapping and terroristic threating with a firearm (or the Georgia equivalent charges), and Bryan was an accessory. Then their target attempted self-defense, and was killed for it.
I’m not a fan of felony murder, but this is what it’s for. If the senior McMichaels or Bryan simply stepped away and didn’t act, Arbery doesn’t die. Their crime (and it was a crime) facilitated Arbery’s death, so they share guilt in his murder.
I have no problem with posting watch on your own property, or putting together a neighborhood watch for the entire neighborhood. However, that does not make you Roscoe P. Coltraine. Play stupid games, you get the stupid prize.
There may come a time when the vigilance committees come back and private justice starts occurring for crimes. I pray they don’t, because then justice gets cheap and rare. As Roper was told, the land is planted thick with laws, and when we cut them all down, where do we turn for shelter when the devil turns back around on us?
geoffb wrote (and JimNorCal seconded) “Do they know about Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian?”
For those unfamiliar with the reference, search online for “Knoxville horror.” While you’re at it, do the same for “Wichita massacre.”
If you were previously unfamiliar with both of these, consider this question: Do you think you’d know about them if racial roles had been reversed?
A more recent test of the same phenomenon is the murder of Cannon Hinnant.
…
This is interesting: Compare Wikipedia on the Hinnant case …
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Cannon_Hinnant
… with its coverage of the Arbery case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Ahmaud_Arbery
No photo in the first case (and photos are widely available), but there **is** a photo of the deceased in the latter case.
Thank you, Paul.
I always saw felony murder as an extension of the eggshell skull rule. You take your mayhem as you make it. I think it feels wrong in some cases today because it is applied to crimes that weren’t felonies under the old common law system that developed felony murder. I don’t think there would be much debate about applying felony murder to what would qualify as common law burglary, robbery, or arson.
I don’t recall false imprisonment being one of the old common law felonies. Kidnapping was, but I’m not sure these defendants’ actions would meet the elements of kidnapping, even given that they did not have the right to make a citizens arrest.
It’s also worth clarifying what felony murder did and did not do here. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think felony murder was even relevant for the shooter. If he was in the act of committing a crime, then he could not use self defense. For the other two, felony murder wasn’t the difference between conviction and acquittal. It was the difference between being convicted of murder and being convicted of felony false imprisonment.
Hard to think of a clearer example of the point that cops are to protect the criminal.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think felony murder was even relevant for the shooter. I
You’re wrong. All three men were convicted of felony murder. Which is frankly bizarre in regard to the 3d defendant, who was merely following along behind and was not carrying a firearm.
These asinine charges were made possible by the Georgia legislature’s neglect of proper maintenance of its penal code (something you see in other states as well). ‘Felony murder’ is triggered not by a discrete menu of crimes, but by any felony. ‘Felony’ is defined as any crime for which the notional minimum sentence is at least a year. Attempts to commit a felony are treated as felonies no matter what the discrete crime is. The 3d defendant is treated as having been a willing party to a jointly executed felony even though mens rea and a precisely formulated plan were absent. That’s the daisy-chain of reasoning that gets an ordinary middle aged man like William Bryan a life sentence. Our court system is vicious and worthless.
The McMichaels were committing attempted kidnapping and terroristic threating with a firearm (or the Georgia equivalent charges), and Bryan was an accessory. Then their target attempted self-defense, and was killed for it.
The terms ‘kidnapping’, ‘terroristic’, and ‘accessory’ do not mean what you fancy they mean. (And the state did not make use of any of these terms in securing and indictment of the three men).
Art Deco – The shooter was also convicted of malice murder, which is the more serious charge. If there was no felony murder, the shooter would still have been convicted.
Art Deco – The shooter was also convicted of malice murder, which is the more serious charge.
It’s also bizarre. Where is the evidence of pre-meditation or of depraved indifference to human life? In what other state in the union would a death resulting from a struggle over a weapon be treated this way in the absence of premeditation or depraved indifference? Tom Wolfe used the term ‘another Bronx piece-of-shit’ to describe homicides of this sort. The section on Homicide in the Penal Law of New York is composed so as to provide for a negotiated guilty plea to 1st degree manslaughter in these cases; 1st degree manslaughter is a class B rather than a class A felony.
NB, they larded up a nine count indictment of him when a three count indictment would have covered all the bases.
The State of Georgia is set to sentence to life-without-parole one young adult, his elderly father, and a middle-aged neighbor — none of whom have a rap sheet their detractors have pointed to — because they pursued a known offender and said offender attempted impetuously to seize the gun one of them was carrying. We’re not talking about whether one, two, or three of them should be deemed culpable and punished. We are talking about a maximal penalty for all three that is applied only to heinous criminals.
I
JimNorCal wrote “Not everyone will self disarm.
Not everyone will wring their hands. Especially as knowledge spreads about what faces those unable to protect themselves.”
True. I was writing about what the Progressives expect to happen, and they are usually blind to the fact that people are not just widgets to be tweaked. Thomas Wictor, before Twitter banned him, pointed out that in South American societies, where the legal system exists only to protect those in power, the normal people in their neighborhoods, ruthlessly punish, with or without guns – mostly without, those they believe, rightly or wrongly, are committing crimes there.
In a good legal system the police and courts actually protect, both the criminals and the innocent, against unjust punishment. The Left is pushing our system away from that but what come after is not what they expect and will be very harsh to everyone.
We are slowly but surely headed toward a race war. If the kill ratio is 1:1, whites, the oppressed and huge majority of gun owners, will surely win.
The Waukesha black perp ran over the mother of one of his children intentionally, causing dislocation of her femur and an ankle fracture, with his tire marks on her pants, and he, with a vigorous criminal record, was released on $1000 bail?
LeBron James had two courtside fans forcibly ejected at yesterday’s NBA game because they said something unseemly. Any idea how much courtside seats cost? and the NBA has its own anthem for its 75% black players.
It is enough to make me feel anti-black.
Art Deco; Bauxite:
Malice murder was a bizarre verdict that I don’t think anyone expected and seems unsupported by the evidence. It’s an indication this jury was vindictive and just didn’t like Travis.
Felony murder is bizarre as applied to the video guy, of course. That’s why I’ve been against felony murder for about 50 years. It leads to bad results, IMHO, although the rationale is that it will prevent people from engaging in felonies. I don’t think it does.
Art Deco:
Life without parole is an option but life with parole is also an option. It’s up to the judge. See this (I’m assuming it’s correct).
Art Deco:
I’m in agreement with your comment at 8:58 AM. Felony murder is a travesty. I felt that way when I was a liberal Democrat way back when, and I feel that way now. It leads to many many miscarriages of justice.
}}} Once that was established as the law per the judge’s instructions, the jury had almost no recourse but to decide that the defendants were in the act of committing a felony against Arbery, and therefore the felony murder convictions would almost certainly follow.
Neo, this is blatantly and glaringly NOT TRUE.
The jury is NEVER EVER “required” by anything to find the defendant “guilty”.
It does not matter the “instructions” to the jury, the law, the facts, or anything.
The jury is ALWAYS ALWAYS able to vote its conscience — if they feel the penalties are too harsh, the charges too much, it does not matter if all the forces of the planet are set against them, they are, IN FACT, able to, and indeed, supposed to, vote with their conscience, and find a defendant “not guilty”, if they believe the penalty would be unjust.
This is and has always been the case, since the concept of a trial by your peers became a reality in England a thousand years ago. While there are times in which it has been abrogated routinely, it has been consistently the case for about **400** years now.
The most famous case of it involved, and made famous, William Penn (as in “Pennsylvania”), in which a judge ordered a jury to be thrown into jail until they returned a verdict he wanted, they refused, an appeal to the crown occurred, and the judge’s efforts were repudiated.
It has flowed down to America via English Common Law (as opposed to the other main European system, the Code Napoleon) and has been repeatedly supported by challenges made to the SCotUS (the last one making it to the SCotUS was over a century ago, BUT they have refused to consider any efforts to reject it). Such rejections, called “Jury Nullification”, have played important parts in the people’s rejection of what they considered unjust applications of the law — especially prominent in Fugitive Slave cases, as well as a major number of Abolition cases. These abolition cases, where the people refused to find defendants “guilty” in spite of them being obviously guilty, were part of the impetus to repeal Abolition.
The one UNFORTUNATE thing is that the courts ARE allowed to reject any attempt to INFORM the jury of their rights — and responsibilities — in this context. If people don’t come into the trial knowing that they don’t have to pay ANY attention to the facts in the matter of finding someone NOT guilty, the court not only will not properly inform them of this, it will stomp on any efforts by anyone IN the court to actually make the jury aware of it.
Judges — and lawyers — don’t like the idea of juries making up their own damned minds, and fuck them for thinking they (the lawyers and judges) have the final say.
There are a hell of a lot of people in prison who would NOT be if these principles were well known, and many of them have never belonged there. Anyone convicted of non-violent drug charges not involving minors and/or signiicant distribution, for example, probably has a good chance of not being convicted in ANY jurisdiction, especially these days. Particularly if the drug was marijuana.
This is partly what happened in the OJ case, and should have happened — when it became clear that the cops colluded to falsify evidence, that jury should have said fuck, no, not convicting — because the simple fact is, we cannot have cops even thinking for a brief second of creating evidence to convict. We need cops TERRIFIED of screwing up, just so they
a — don’t screw up
b — don’t think they can get away with anything because they “know” the perp is guilty.
At ANY TIME, the jurors are charged with not just the FACTS of the case, but THIS APPLICATION OF THE LAW. If they feel the application is unjust, they not only can, but SHOULD refuse to convict.
Now, a major significance of this is that a jury nullification, unlike an action by a judge, does not set legal precedent in any regards whatsoever.
That is, it never ever, in any manner, directly changes the law (unlike a ruling from a judge saying a given law is Unconstitutional, for example). Mind you, it DOES reflect the opinions of the mass of the populous about any given law — in particular, once more, the Fugitive Slave Laws and Abolition — and can render those laws moot simply by making it a case which will never render a conviction, hence the charges will never be brought by a DA.
But the people could have nullified marijuana laws two decades ago, just by refusing to convict for minor offenses.
But peeps have been so ignorant of these facts now, that few know they have the power, much less the right to do this.
There was, in fact, a #$^%$%&$%%$& “Law And Order” spinoff (not very successful, and deservedly so) which actually made the bald faced LIE of having a judge openly state that “jury nullification is illegal”. It is not, in any regards. So the merdia is in on the scam.
====
Don’t take my word for it:
https://fija.org/
THAT SAID, for the Arbery case, I would almost certainly have, not knowing all the facts available to the jury, attempted to hang the jury, for the simple reason that I DO believe they should probably NOT be “Not Guilty” of anything, just because the idiot prosecution over-reached.
I have little doubt they are guilty of manslaughter (or whatever it is called in GA), but see zero publicly available evidence to support the idea that they went after him with intent to kill, much less malicious intent. Even if they were being racist in thinking him a likely crook (which some evidence supports but not enough, and they had no access to it, so, yes, there was probably racism at the basis for it), this does not mean they wished to step outside the law in order to render some kind of brute field justice. That they claimed it was a citizen’s arrest until they no longer were allowed to due to specific requirements of that process show that it shows at least the possible reasonable alternative mindset available for their actions which qualifies as a “reasonable doubt” in identifying “intent”, much less “malicious intent”.
This appears to be an injustice, though that will devolve to sentencing.
Not even the same LEAGUE of injustice that a KR conviction would have been, but I would say manslaughter would have been far more appropriate for a death that was, by all signs, far more about widespread stupidity of all involved — Arbery for fighting with a clearly armed man instead of waiting for the police, and them for approaching him with loaded weapons, rather than having them approach him unarmed while having someone well outside his reach armed in support — than it was about anyone thinking they should be able to kill someone and get away with it.
Thank you O’bloodyHell for clarifying the issue. No way was that a just verdict. And I don’t give a damn what GA law specifies. Bad law is not better than no law when it renders greater injustice than no law.
Only the legally inclined put the letter of the law above the spirit of the law, which is that true justice prevail. As without justice, law is but tyranny formalized and declared legitimate through armed force.
Geoffrey Britain:
Oh, so you think you can make the correct decisions rather than the law – you are above the law because you know what justice is. You write, “Only the legally inclined put the letter of the law above the spirit of the law.” That’s what all tyrannical reformers say, including the left or maybe especially the left.
That’s why the rule of law is elevated above your opinion or mine, even when “the law is an ass.”
The solution is to change the law. Another solution – legal in Georgia – is jury nullification. This jury could have done that, apparently legally (I believe, anyway). They chose not to.
The law did not dictate finding Travis guilty of malice murder. That was the jury’s bad decision. They also didn’t have to find the third guy guilty – the law did not dictate that, I don’t think, but they did anyway.
I agree with Kentucky Packrat.
It is interesting to read about prosecutorial overreach in defense of people who brought a long arm to a citizen’s arrest when they didn’t know a crime was committed.
If malice murder was not supported by the evidence, or some of the other items, could they be reversed on appeal? I have no knowledge of what can be appealed, and what can’t.
I don’t know Georgia law, but the two guys in the pickup truck set up the situation which ended in a death, and that means they were not innocent of that death. If they were over-charged, well, Kyle Rittenhouse makes the point that over-charging is common and is a problem.
@ Kentucky Packrat > “There may come a time when the vigilance committees come back and private justice starts occurring for crimes. I pray they don’t, because then justice gets cheap and rare. As Roper was told, the land is planted thick with laws, and when we cut them all down, where do we turn for shelter when the devil turns back around on us?”
I was thinking just this morning that in all the weeks of trial-watching, I had not yet seen a reference to what is usually one of the most quoted movies on this board.
@AesopFan:
If my other comment gets through moderation, see where I beg to differ.
Nobody is talking about chopping them all down. Just most of them down.
The Law today is the primary instrument out to oppress you and yours. At the same time, it is doing increasingly little to protect you from those who see you as prey.
If you want good laws and good enforcement of those laws, then you need to change the people making and enforcing those laws. Said laws protect the people you need to replace.
Hmm…
The entirety of English Law when More and Roper walked the earth (Chancery, King’s Bench, Common Law, whatever else… I’m just pulling these out of the usual place at random) probably wouldn’t contain more bits of information (in the information theoretic sense) than a single year’s opaque administrative rulings for one or two tribunals operating under the IRS or EPA with basically zero oversight from any elected official.
Plus the Three Letters and Tech Friends.
History is Bunk? Try the Law 🙂
I’m with neo on this case: if Arbery really had been up to no good he’d have been caught most likely at some point eventually if folks had just continued to watch him; but as it stands now, he gets to be an angel and three other people get to go to prison.
I’m with Zaphod on the larger point, that the law is a weapon being used against us by those who wish to rule us. (This case however is not an illustration of that.) The “law” nowadays is not what we’re told it is nor what it once was. The law is whatever unelected functionaries choose to make up, it is impossible to comply with in every way, and so selective enforcement of laws that cannot be obeyed is a source of power to these unelected functionaries and their cronies.
There may be a way to restore the law by working within the law. I certainly hope so. But if overthrowing the law is never moral, then the American founding is fundamentally illegitimate. If America was founded legitimately, then it’s just a question of are we at that point again and what would it take to put us there.
“There may be a way to restore the law by working within the law. I certainly hope so. But if overthrowing the law is never moral, then the American founding is fundamentally illegitimate. If America was founded legitimately, then it’s just a question of are we at that point again and what would it take to put us there.”
As good a point as I’ve ever seen made on this blog.
(previously posted some days ago over at Althouse)
Here’s a link to the full unedited video (14 minutes) of Glynn County, Georgia police officers’ body and dash cameras showing their encounter with Mr. Arbery in 2017…
https://vimeo.com/647957977
Arbery was bizarrely dressed, his vehicle registration and/or his drivers license were suspended/expired, and the (c. 70% white and predominantly rural) county’s cops were exceedingly polite, conciliatory, and non-confrontational.
Until one of them felt threatened enough by Arbery’s in-his-face combativeness that he took out his taser and made Arbery kneel for no more than a minute until he calmed down, at which point when the cop re-holstered his taser.
In the end, because of his vehicular papers being defunct, Arbery had to leave his car in situ and walk out of there. The cops’ treatment of this clearly dangerous and crazed character was impeccably profesional from beginning to end.