US Court Sentences Dad and Son Who Killed Ahmaud Arbery to Life for Civil Rights Violations

The dad and son convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery were both given an additional sentence of life in prison on federal hate crime charges on Monday, August 8, while their neighbor was sentenced to 35 years in prison, according to NBC News.

A judge also required that 36-year-old Travis McMichael, 66-year-old Greg McMichael, and 52-year-old William "Roddie" Bryan, serve their sentences in state prison and not in federal prison as had been requested by their attorneys.

U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood said during Greg McMichael's sentencing that a young man is dead and Ahmaud Arbery will be forever 25. She added that a jury found that what happened to him was because he is Black.

McMichaels sentenced to life imprisonment on federal hate crime charges

Bryan and the McMichaels, who are all white, were found guilty back in February on federal hate crime charges in the killing of Arbery, a Black man who was running in their neighborhood when the defendants confronted him back in February 2020. The three men were convicted of all of the federal charges filed against them, including attempted kidnapping, hate crimes, and the use of a firearm to commit a crime.

Prosecutors sought life sentences for all three men but the judge decided to spare Bryan from that ruling. Godbey Wood said she thought it was necessary to distinguish Bryan from the McMichaels as he did not bring a gun with him when they chased Arbery unlike his neighbors.

Godbey Wood said it is not lost on the court that two men brought guns to that situation that had their worst effect and Bryan was not one of them. She added, however, that he was still deserving of an awfully long sentence.

She said that by the time Bryan serves his federal sentence, he will be close to 90 years old. Godbey Wood determined that the sentence imposed is a very lengthy summary and it is one that has been earned as the judge emphasized that Arbery never got the chance to be 26, according to 11Alive.

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McMichaels to serve their sentence in state prison

Prosecutor Tara Lyons called the sentencing hearings the end of at least one chapter in an excruciatingly painful journey for the family of Ahmaud Arbery, for his community and for an entire nation that has wept for the victim.

The three men were sentenced separately, in back-to-back trials on Monday. Amy Lee Copeland, who is Travis McMichael's attorney, asked during her client's sentencing that the judge allow him to serve his sentence in federal prison.

The lawyer argued that McMichael had received hundreds of threats and would probably be killed in state custody. A.J. Balbo, an attorney for Greg McMichael, told the judge his client was medically not fit to serve his sentence in state prison.

The prosecution and members of Arbery's family asked that the McMichaels serve both of their sentences in state prison and the judge heeded their request, according to CNN.

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