Jogging in Georgia while black.

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DevilsAdvocate said:
I've been surprised that the McMichaels were not charged with false imprisonment, either instead of or in addition to aggravated assault.

The aggravated assault and felony murder charge seems a bit circuitous and difficult. Aggravated assault that results in death is...murder. So why not just go straight to murder? It seems a bit like saying someone murdered someone, which is a felony, and someone died as a result of that felony, which is also felony murder. I'm guessing they are going with the angle that pointing the bun at Arbery was aggravated assault, and Arbery died as a result of that felony, so it is felony murder. But then I'm not sure why it isn't just murder.

The aggravated assault charge is more difficult because they will have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Travis unlawfully pointed the gun at Arbery. It isn't clear in the video when that happened. Plus, there can be the claim of self defense. That gets into the whole messy business of whether or not Travis had the right to use deadly force to protect himself from someone who was charging at him and maybe grabbing his gun.

I think that winds out to Travis not having a claim to self defense because Arbery had a right to charge because he was being illegally detained. That's false imprisonment. The only defense to that charge would be citizen's arrest, which is on very shaky ground at best. A false imprisonment charge for the McMichaels seems pretty solid.



This originates from 25 C.J. 454
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The issue is with Georgia Law. Murder needs to be either premeditated, or during the commission of a dangerous felony, such as aggravated assault. Unlawful detention for a basis of the felony needed has never been tested in court so I expect that they have go with the aggravated assault instead.

In Georgia, for a common assault charge it is enough to put someone in fear of being attacked, if this is done with aggravating circumstances, such as having a weapon involved, then that is aggravated assault.

Chasing someone while openly carrying guns is probably enough to meet this standard even without pointing one of the directly at the person being chased.

Now that Roddie has been charged, I wouldn't be surprised to see further charges on the McMichaels, especially if Roddie agrees to testify to get a sentence of charge reduction.
 
PhantomWolf said:
The issue is with Georgia Law. Murder needs to be either premeditated, or during the commission of a dangerous felony, such as aggravated assault. Unlawful detention for a basis of the felony needed has never been tested in court so I expect that they have go with the aggravated assault instead.
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Oh, yeah. Thanks. The homicide laws in Georgia are a bit odd. Murder requires malice aforethought. Voluntary manslaughter requires sudden passion. Nothing in between. So they have to use aggravated assault + felony murder to get to what would just be murder most other places. It looks like that is pretty typical of the way the law is applied in Georgia.

I guess they will test it with the Roddie case, then. But I wouldn't be surprised with a plea deal for Roddie. It is probably a much more difficult case (depending on what the police know that we don't).
 
DevilsAdvocate said:
I guess they will test it with the Roddie case, then. But I wouldn't be surprised with a plea deal for Roddie. It is probably a much more difficult case (depending on what the police know that we don't).
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I was surprised at the Roddie charge myself. What we have seen so far doesn't seem to me to justify a felony charge. However, the police have seen more. It may very well be that he used his car as a deadly weapon in a threatening manner.
 
SuburbanTurkey said:
Curious about the timing. Earlier this week the GBI executed a search warrant on the McMichael's house, now this belated arrest of Roddie. Wonder what has changed over the last few weeks. I keep thinking back to unsubstantiated rumors of social media chatter by the killers when it seemed like the case wasn't going anywhere. Maybe a computer got seized?
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The video was released May 5. That's when GBI bot involved. New DA assigned on May 12. The previous DA accepted the offer of help from GBI and asked that the case be assigned to a new DA. So GBI was probably waiting until the new DA got assigned and up to speed before taking any action.

But maybe they got a phone or computer that showed communications between McMichaels and Roddie. But reports were that nobody saw GBI taking anything away.

So maybe they have new evidence. Or maybe it is just getting things in order proceeding with the new crew.
 
lionking said:
Collusion and planning well before they started the hunt. Hitting the whole “spur of the moment pursuing a thrift” scenario right out of the park.

What do you think will be revealed? He can’t reasonably say “I wasn’t involved”. He was clearly slowly following Arbery and ensuring he ran towards the ambushers. He can only argue for limited involvement which will require testifying against the other hillbillies.

You might imagine him saying they were all righteously justified. He is no doubt stupid, but I doubt his lawyer is.
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Small quibble. They aren't hillbillies. Definitely flatlanders. Very flat, considering that where they lived is largely reclaimed swamp by the coast.

(I should know. I'm a real hillbilly and proud of it. Raised in one of the hilliest parts of West Virginia. Steps in the sidewalks and everything. People from San Francisco were surprised by how hilly that part of WV is. :))

Aside from that I concur with everything you said. Although it doesn't matter all that much about how smart their lawyer is, if someone on the jury is stupid (or bigoted, but I repeat myself) enough.
 
DevilsAdvocate said:
Oh, yeah. Thanks. The homicide laws in Georgia are a bit odd. Murder requires malice aforethought. Voluntary manslaughter requires sudden passion. Nothing in between. So they have to use aggravated assault + felony murder to get to what would just be murder most other places. It looks like that is pretty typical of the way the law is applied in Georgia.
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Not all that odd. If you plan to kill someone then it's clearly murder. Murder One.

Manslaughter can vary by recklessness, etc. This changes the seriousness of the charge and resulting sentencing guidelines, but the core premise is that there was no intent to murder.

A death resulting from the commission of a felony is felony murder. That's a different critter altogether. Intent is not a factor. The death is classified as a murder because it happened during the commission of another felony crime.

Example: Two people rob a bank and are caught in the act by police. During the ensuing firefight one of the two bank robbers is shot and killed by the police. His partner, the one that lived, is guilty of felony murder even though he certainly didn't set out with the intent to kill his partner.

I guess they will test it with the Roddie case, then. But I wouldn't be surprised with a plea deal for Roddie. It is probably a much more difficult case (depending on what the police know that we don't).
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What will be tested is the prosecutor's ability to prove that Roddie was a willing participant in the chase and entrapment of Arbery. If he was then he is guilty of felony murder every bit as much as the other two.

If they let Roddie do a plea deal it will only be because they want him to testify against the two McMichaels. Unless he has something really juicy to offer them, like testifying that he heard them planning to kill Arbery before the whole chase began, then I don't know if they'll bother with a plea deal.
 
Skeptic Tank said:
What's wrong with the concept of "there's a thief fleeing from a neighbor's house, we're going to confront him and try to stop him from getting away before the cops arrive, and just in case he's armed we'll make sure we are too, so we don't end up dead"



That seems fairly sensible, legal, rational, and not infused with racist hatred or bloodlust or anything. No?
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I know. What could go wrong?
 
Meadmaker said:
I was surprised at the Roddie charge myself. What we have seen so far doesn't seem to me to justify a felony charge. However, the police have seen more. It may very well be that he used his car as a deadly weapon in a threatening manner.
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I think something like that is probably it.

If they can establish that he was working in concert with the McMichaels by driving behind Arbery and pushing him toward their roadblock then he is part of the whole shebang.


They could dangle a felony murder charge over his head and use it to get him to plead out on a lesser charge, or roll over on the other two

If he has anything to roll over with that the prosecution can't already prove.

Personally, if he was chasing Arbery with his car, then I think he's just as guilty as they are. He's gonna have to claim he was just following along to get everything recorded on his phone.

I doubt that.
 
Skeptic Tank said:
What's wrong with the concept of "there's a thief fleeing from a neighbor's house, we're going to confront him and try to stop him from getting away before the cops arrive, and just in case he's armed we'll make sure we are too, so we don't end up dead"

That seems fairly sensible, legal, rational, and not infused with racist hatred or bloodlust or anything. No?
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1/ You don't know the person is a thief.
2/ You see a person running away from an open construction site, not an occupied house, and you have no basis to presume anything.
3/ You have no legal authority to do anything, let alone pursue and confront him.
4/ If your Daddy is riding shotgun with a .357 magnum, you can safely leave your own weapon in your pickup while you politely ask a pedestrian if he will spare a moment to speak with you.

There's nothing sensible, legal or rational about their behavior, and you can be sure they wouldn't have done it to an elderly white guy,.
 
Bob001 said:
1/ You don't know the person is a thief.
2/ You see a person running away from an open construction site, not an occupied house, and you have no basis to presume anything.
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And right here you can add a 2.5: You can see the person and tell that if they did take something it would have to be small and light enough that it could be carried in a pocket and allow unhindered running, so who cares? It's not like contractors are going to leave expensive tools in an open, unfinished house.

That's going to be a huge logical hurdle for the defense to leap if they try to claim they thought they were in pursuit of a thief. Did they think he stole a pocket's worth of nails? An uninstalled doorknob?

No, they wanted to make clear to the ****** that he wasn't welcome on their [public] street and they figured confronting him with guns would convey that message. They also may have figured that they'd get away with it since they had an in with the prosecutor's office. They might have gotten away with it if it hadn't been for the meddling murderer releasing the video. Stupid redneck.
 
Meadmaker said:
I was surprised at the Roddie charge myself. What we have seen so far doesn't seem to me to justify a felony charge. However, the police have seen more. It may very well be that he used his car as a deadly weapon in a threatening manner.
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Again, check this video

https://www.nytimes.com/video/us/100000007142853/ahmaud-arbery-video-911-georgia.html?smid=pl-share

Roddy blocks Arbury from retreating back down Buford and turns to give chase down Holmes. At some point, the McMichaels' get past Roddy and in front of Arbury to block him at the place where Arbury is subsequently murdered.

For mine, that makes Roddy a participant in the chase so that also makes him a participant in the felony - therefore a charge of murder against him is justified.
 
Max_mang said:
Is there evidence of the highlighted? I haven't dug deeply into all the reports, but the ones I did saw early on didn't make him out to be more than a bystander who took out his camera when this disgusting thing was happening. Are there any signs of a previous relationship between him and the other two guys?
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I’m going on the re-enactment by the newspaper (I think) upthread which shows Roddy following Arbery in the initial chase before he ran in the other direction, and Roddy then doing a u-turn to continue the chase. He wasn’t just a bystander or he wouldn’t have been charged.

I’ll bet he wishes he never took the video.
 
quadraginta said:
Small quibble. They aren't hillbillies. Definitely flatlanders. Very flat, considering that where they lived is largely reclaimed swamp by the coast.

(I should know. I'm a real hillbilly and proud of it. Raised in one of the hilliest parts of West Virginia. Steps in the sidewalks and everything. People from San Francisco were surprised by how hilly that part of WV is. :))

Aside from that I concur with everything you said. Although it doesn't matter all that much about how smart their lawyer is, if someone on the jury is stupid (or bigoted, but I repeat myself) enough.
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Good point. I’ll admit to trying to get a rise out of their defenders. You know, in the same way as those who think the McMichaels have a case to answered are called “leftists” and “race traitors”. Okay the latter term has not yet been used. I’m getting in early.
 
lionking said:
Good point. I’ll admit to trying to get a rise out of their defenders. You know, in the same way as those who think the McMichaels have a case to answered are called “leftists” and “race traitors”. Okay the latter term has not yet been used. I’m getting in early.
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Oh, I have been called that before. It doesn't bother me at all - when a racist scumbag calls me a "race traitor", I wear that as a badge of honour. It tells me "dat scumbag ain't got nuttin'!"
 
JoeMorgue said:
GLYNN COUNTY, Ga. — The Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested William “Roddie” Bryan Jr., age 50, on Thursday on charges of Felony Murder & Criminal Attempt to Commit False Imprisonment, according to a news release.

https://www.actionnewsjax.com/news/...ted-murder-charge/H4Z6Z557ZNAINIHAZKH5XQWLKM/
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This is not a good sign for the McMichaels.

I see this as an indicator that they view things the same way that most in this thread do - the McMichaels and Bryan were committing a felony, during the course of which someone was killed and under law that means it was felony murder.
 
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