The attorney for Ahmaud Arbery’s family said early Monday morning that he plans to oppose a plea deal two of Arbery’s killers reached with federal prosecutors, CNN reported.
A Glynn County, Georgia, court found the three men charged with killing Arbery — William Bryan, Greg McMichael, and Greg’s son Travis McMichael —guilty of felony murder in November. All three were sentenced to life in prison.
In addition to the state murder conviction, the three men also face federal hate crime charges. Per CNN, documents filed Sunday in federal court show that the McMichaels have reached a plea deal with federal prosecutors. Bryan is not mentioned in the filing.
S. Lee Merritt — the attorney for Arbery’s mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, and a Democratic candidate for Texas attorney general — wrote on Instagram at around 2:00 a.m. Monday that “[t]his back room deal represents a betrayal to the Arbery family.”
Merritt alleged that the plea bargain would “transfer” the McMichaels to “preferred Federal Custody” and that he planned to oppose the plea deal at a scheduled hearing at 10:00 a.m. Monday.
Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was murdered in 2020 when Bryan and the McMichaels chased and confronted Arbery with guns while he was out jogging. The three men, who believed Arbery was connected to a series of burglaries in the neighborhood, pursued him in a truck. Travis McMichael fatally shot Arbery during a struggle over Travis’ shotgun.
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