Gregory and Travis McMichael Arrested in Slaying of Ahmaud Arbery

Andrew Donaldson

Born and raised in West Virginia, Andrew has since lived and traveled around the world several times over. Though frequently writing about politics out of a sense of duty and love of country, most of the time he would prefer discussions on history, culture, occasionally nerding on aviation, and his amateur foodie tendencies. He can usually be found misspelling/misusing words on Twitter @four4thefire and his food writing website Yonder and Home. Andrew is the host of Heard Tell podcast.

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24 Responses

  1. veronica d says:

    Honestly though, the fact it took such a loud public outcry to get prosecutors to act — it’s monstrous.Report

  2. Oscar Gordon says:

    But for the video getting out, they might never have been charged at all.Report

    • Philip H in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

      Agree completely. the local DA said the day before the video leaked that he was going to refer to a grand jury because the firestorm was slowly building, and Gov. “Let’s Open Georgia Back Up so other people can die” Abbot offered the state’s help – whatever that was supposed to mean. Once the video surfaced it took less then 24 hours for the GBI to charge and arrest these guys.

      My guess – after a hung jury trial that takes years to convene because any person of color in the pool will be thrown out by the DA, these guys walk.Report

  3. InMD says:

    Just awful. I’ve learned to bite my tongue until all the facts come out but man.. sounds so senseless.Report

  4. LeeEsq says:

    Good.Report

  5. Jaybird says:

    Reason has an excellent article on this:

    Report

    • Marchmaine in reply to Jaybird says:

      Wow, 2 months? I assumed this happened the day before yesterday – the day the video hit.Report

      • InMD in reply to Marchmaine says:

        Seems like the state’s attorney or DA or whatever they’re called down there really dropped the ball on the transition. Granted if they felt that they needed a grand jury to indict I can see how it would’ve been tough to make that happen with the pandemic. Not sure how charging works in GA.Report

        • Philip H in reply to InMD says:

          The County DA in the County it happened in is reported to have told officers at the scene not to arrest the suspects who were detained and whom officers reported they believed they had probably cause to arrest. She then formally recused her office from the investigation a couple of weeks later because the father in the pair was a retired investigator in her office and former local police detective.

          The state Attorney General then assigned an adjacent County DA to investigate and prosecute and he recused a couple of weeks later after the victim’s mother contacted him with evidence (probably aimed at a wrongful death lawsuit) that his son worked in the original DA’s office. His recusal letter to the state also said he hadn’t found probable cause.

          the State Attorney General assigned a third county DA to the case who said the matter should go to a grand jury. That statement was made around the time the video began circulating. But all state court proceedings are suspended in Georgia (in spite of the reopening of the state) until late June, so before a grand jury could be impaneled the Governor asked the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to intercede.

          GBI executed arrest warrants in 36 hours against the two men on capitol murder charges.

          I have theories, well informed by being a Southern White Man theories. But your mileage may vary.Report

          • CJColucci in reply to Philip H says:

            Any of these things, taken separately or together, might very well be legitimate, and might innocently explain the delay. But I can’t fault the people who brought public pressure merely because it might not, ultimately, have been necessary. There have been too many cases where something like this would have been buried to be confident that this one would proceed on the up-and-up.Report

    • Mike Schilling in reply to Jaybird says:

      As always, don’t read the comments.Report

  6. Chip Daniels says:

    This makes me think of all our discussions about political theories and economic theories, and how they are all predicated on some mechanistic theory of inputs and outputs- i.e., if you have system X, hold all other variables steady, then it will produce outcome Y, always and everywhere reliably.

    Except, those other variables are never steady.

    We live in a world governed by the Wilhoit Pinciple, where the laws protect one class but do not bind it, and bind another class but do not protect it.

    We don’t all live in the same political system. In Texas a woman breaks the law, but because of her tribal affiliations, is released almost instantly by the Governor and the state Supreme Court; In Georgia man is chased and gunned down in the street, and the legal system needs to be shamed by nationwide outcry to reluctantly take action.

    We don’t live in the same economic system; In an economic crisis, well connected elites are given VIP concierge service, while everyone else is left to rot.

    And as always in our world, your class is determined by a combination of race and wealth.Report

  7. Another example of the unnecessary presence of guns leading to tragedy.Report

    • Philip H in reply to Mike Schilling says:

      Another example of ingrained, systemic white privilege leading to tragedy.Report

      • Oscar Gordon in reply to Philip H says:

        White privilege coupled to the privilege of government agents (because former agents in good standing are often still regarded as current agents).Report

        • Chip Daniels in reply to Oscar Gordon says:

          That’s how social injustice works, where the underlying racism or misogyny turns every failure against the hated underclass.

          Bureaucratic bungling exists, but is particularly acute on the oppressed class;
          Police misconduct exists, but is chiefly used against the oppressed class;
          Environmental pollution exists, but is pushed to the places where the oppressed class lives;
          And the tools by which citizens fight these issues are blunted or ignored when oppressed people try to use them.

          Which is why any discussion of one of these issues inevitably gets connected to a discussion of racism or misogyny, since that’s the underlying fuel powering them.Report

          • Brandon Berg in reply to Chip Daniels says:

            It’s weird that you bring up misogyny, when the overwhelming majority of homicides in which a self-defense claim is made, including this particular case, involve male decedents. Wouldn’t misandry be more salient here?Report

      • Brandon Berg in reply to Philip H says:

        Could you outline your logic here? Black people kill other black people at a per-capita rate at least 50 times greater than the rate at which white people kill black people, so statistically white privilege seems to be an impediment to killing black people.Report

        • Philip H in reply to Brandon Berg says:

          In this case a white former cop thought he had the authority to go chase down a person who he claims matched a burglary suspect – and the most recent burglary reported around him was of his son’s car two months prior.

          He took weapons, got his son, also armed, and confronted the “suspect” all without ever calling the police (until after the kid was dead). Then he nearly skated because he was a former investigator in the local DA’s office – who herself is reported to have told local cops not to arrest him even though they felt they had probable cause.

          That’s white privilege backed by a systemic racist structure.Report