Update (June 24, 2020): The three men involved in the killing of Ahmaud Arbery have been indicted on murder charges by a grand jury, CNN reported.
Travis’ father, Gregory McMichael was standing in the front yard and called out to his son after seeing Arbery.
George E. Barnhill, a prosecutor in the case, told the police in a letter that Gregory and Travis acted within the state’s citizen’s arrest law and Travis acted out of self-defense.
Because Arbery was a “burglary suspect,” according to Barnhill, Travis and Gregory had “solid firsthand probable cause” and were justified in chasing him under citizen’s arrest laws.
Barnhill, who is the district attorney for Georgia’s Waycross Judicial Circuit, has since been recused from the case after Arbery’s family said he had a conflict of interest.
