The Ahmed Arbery Murder Sentencing
Do we have to be brutal to be fair?
Let me start by saying that it is a good day in America when vigilantes are tried and convicted for hunting down and murdering a man whose only crime was jogging-while-black.
I watched a lot of the sentencing day. I have a life so I couldn’t sit still through it all. But a big chunk of the prosecutor and a couple of the defense attorneys, Arbery’s family, and of course the judge passing sentence. The judge had virtually no leeway. His words were concise and hard edged; there was no sympathy, no lingering doubt. These men hunted a living human being and slaughtered him. And they will pay.
But I have issues. I am opposed in all cases to life without parole. And I think the felony murder law, in place in many states under a variety of names, has the potential to remove balance from justice. These practices were paradoxically motivated by a mad rush to lock up young black men for as long as possible. And that is what they are mostly used for.
The three Arbery murderers essentially got the same sentence. They will all die in prison. But one of them actually shot Arbery. Another of them led the hunt but never fired a weapon. The third followed along and took part, but immediately expressed regret, cooperated fully, and provided the evidence that convicted them all. How is it fair or just that they each get the same sentence?
This happens all the time in American justice. The country is addicted to heavy heavy punishment. Our prisons are bursting at the seams. And nowadays it seems like even the juvenile left wants to get in on the act. Far right and far left are in favor of leniency for their own favored crimes and utter brutality for the stuff they don’t like. You can make the list yourself, but it’s pretty obvious.
Meanwhile, we have a laudable wave of liberal district attorneys pursuing sensible policies of no-bail releases, alternative justice, not seeking imprisonment in every case, and focusing on real crime not petty crime. Even so, the ultra-left is demanding brutal sentencing especially for sex crimes and racially motivated crimes. When did it become a radical demand to maximize punishment? Do we have to give up on redemption, human change, mercy, balance?
Let’s get back to my core objectives starting with the felony murder rule. Right now, Ohio is preparing to execute a young man who never killed anyone; he’s the one on the left above. The execution date is July 20, 2022. At the age of 19, Austin Myers and Timothy Mosley committed a robbery during the course of which Mr. Mosley stabbed the victim to death. But Mosley had the good sense to turn state’s evidence, so he got a sentence of life without parole. Mr Myers who, again, never killed anyone, got the death penalty, courtesy of the testimony of his one-time friend, the insistence of the prosecution, and a law that is fundamentally unjust. How is that fair?
For the record, I am opposed to capital punishment in all cases.
As is usual in American jurisprudence, the prosecution is exulting in its lust for blood. There is no question that this was a brutal planned murder, and that the perpetrators should suffer a long term of imprisonment and removal from society. It is hard to imagine how anyone can be as depraved as they were when they conspired to slaughter an innocent person for monetary gain. But how are we better for slaughtering not the slaughterer but the guy who helped him?
People should be convicted, sentenced, and punished for what they did, not for what someone else did.
This would not be the first time a man has been executed for being involved in a crime but not committing the murder. You can see a partial list of such cases at the Death Penalty Information Center website.
Life no parole. There are people who should never walk free again. And we have parole boards in place to ensure that doesn’t happen. But the freewheeling overuse of the life no parole sentence condemns tens of thousands of people, almost entirely men, to a hopeless existence. The statistics on life sentences are staggering, at least 53,000 people in the United States in 2018 had no possibility of ever being free. We will pay the bill for keeping them locked up as they slowly decline into senescence.
Life without parole tells the individual that there is no point in trying to improve himself so that he might eventually be free, that we do not believe he can ever learn the error of his ways. And it gives prosecutors a mighty moral weapon to use against perpetrators and to ingratiate themselves to victims and voters.
But it is not justice. It is not Christian, and I say that as an atheist. It is frankly immoral.
So to the case at hand …
Travis McMichael was convicted of the murder, and justly so because he is one who pulled the trigger. He received life without parole. His father, Gregory, was convicted of felony murder and various other charges, and he too received life without parole. William "Roddie" Bryan Jr. was acquitted on a number of the charges, but was convicted of some of the felony murder charges, and he received life with parole possible after 30 years; he will be in his 80s then, and is unlikely to survive that long.
Why do I object to those sentences? In the Travis McMichael case, just because I object to life no parole. In the case of his father, he didn’t pull the trigger. I am sure he is an asshole and a racist, and he probably instigated the whole thing. But he didn’t pull the trigger; we have no idea if he would have pulled the trigger minus his hothead son. Had sonny boy stayed at home, for all we know Ahmed would be alive. Given his age, the elder McMichael would be unlikely to get to parole. But sentencing should take into account that he didn’t actually kill anybody. It’s hard to have a lot of sympathy here, but we should be fair. We should punish people for what they actually did.
The case of Bryan is more complex. He not only didn’t kill anyone, it’s pretty clear that he did not have murder in his heart. He freely got caught up in his neighbors’ racist madness. When the shots rang out, his heart may well have sunk because that is evidently not what he came out for. He cooperated with police right from the start, was obviously remorseful, and provided the evidence that sealed the conviction. Should that not count for something?
Look at the fear in his face. You see it in every picture of him. He went out to help his neighbors, and he got trapped in their actions. I’m not saying he is a good person. I’m not saying he isn’t a racist, and it appears that he is. He clearly did participate in the hunt that led to Ahmed’s murder. But given the balance of the evidence, surely a sentence of 15 or 20 years would satisfy justice in his case.
That’s what I think.
When I listen to Ahmed’s family, my heart melts. How can anyone deal with such unimaginable loss, the brutal violence of your beloved’s life ripped away so heartlessly. To listen to his mother, it surely makes any feeling person tear up. Were I they, I too would want revenge; no punishment would be adequate.
But justice is constrained to rise above the focused pain of the bereaved, the legitimate national outrage. Justice has to be be specific to the individuals and the specific acts they committed.
Justice must be blind.
As a society we have to be better than revenge. We have to be just. In every case, even the difficult ones.
I agree with all your points. I heard Arbery's mother interviewed on the radio and she called for life without the possibility of parole for all the defendants, which I think is especially unfair for Bryant. It's hard to blame her after her loss, but still... A related issue is the overuse of cruel solitary confinement in our prison system.