The father-son duo convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery have both been given additional life sentences on federal hate crime charges, and their neighbour has been sentenced to 35 years in prison.
On Monday, Travis McMichael, a former U.S. Coast Guard mechanic, his father Gregory McMichael, former Glynn County police, and William Bryan were sentenced in the city of Brunswick in separate hearings by U.S. District Judge Lisa Godbey Wood.
“You acted because of the colour of Mr. Arbery’s skin,” Ms Wood said to Travis McMichael. “I do know that you received a fair trial. It is that kind of a trial that Ahmaud Arbery did not receive before he was shot and killed.”
Ahead of the sentencing, the trio had asked Ms. Wood to consider the location where they would serve, with one lawyer raising concerns about Georgia’s dangerous state prison system, saying her client would be subject to “vigilante justice.”
Ms Wood maintained that she had “neither the authority nor the inclination” to send the three white men to federal prison instead of the Georgia prison system.
The trio were already serving life sentences after being convicted of murder in a state trial last November.
In February, they faced fresh convictions on federal charges for violating Mr Arbery’s civil rights by attacking him because of his race and for attempted kidnapping.
The McMichaels were also found guilty of a firearms charge.
In 2020, Mr Arbery went jogging through in the Satilla Shores neighbourhood near Brunswick when the McMichaels chased him down in their pickup truck, bearing arms. Mr Bryan joined the chase in his pickup truck and recorded Travis McMichael firing a shotgun at Mr Arbery.
