All three of the white men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery two years ago had a history of using racial slurs or memes online or in private conversations, with the man who shot and killed him calling Black people “savages” who “ruin everything,” an FBI agent testified Wednesday.
That man, Travis McMichael, even went so far as to text someone just months before the shooting, “We used to walk around committing hate crimes all day,” Intelligence Analyst Amy Vaughan said at McMichael’s federal hate-crime trial.
Vaughan walked jurors through an extensive, years-long internet history for Arbery’s killers—McMichael, his father Gregory, and William “Roddie” Bryan—at the trial that could add to their already-hefty sentences. The trio appear to have written and spread twisted, racist posts long before the Feb. 23, 2020, homicide that killed Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, in Satilla Shores, Georgia.
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Specifically, Vaughan said, data gathered by investigators shows that at least two of the men frequently used the n-word and other derogatory language in text and social-media messages—and routinely associated the Black community with criminality. While the testimony was not the first time prosecutors painted a picture of unrepentant racism by the defendants, it offered disturbing new evidence of just how ugly they could be.
“Full moon brings out the worst of those savages I guess. I hate those bastards. They ruin everything,” Travis McMichael allegedly messaged a friend about Black people two months before he fired the shots that killed Arbery in the street.
While the three men have been sentenced to life in prison on state charges for Arbery’s murder, prosecutors are now arguing in the federal trial that the trio was motivated by racial animus when they killed him. Prosecutors say the incident, described as a modern-day lynching under the guise of vigilantism, was the result of deadly assumptions made based “on the color of his skin.”
The men face several federal charges, including interfering with Arbery’s right to use a public street because of his race, and kidnapping. The McMichaels, who had initially agreed to plead guilty in a deal that was ultimately rejected by a judge, are also facing a count of using a firearm during the violent crime. All three men have pleaded not guilty.
Outside the courthouse on Wednesday, Arbery’s family told reporters they were disgusted by the trio’s messages—but not exactly surprised.
“I ain’t really in shock,” Marcus Arbery, his father, told The Atlantic Journal-Constitution. “I knew all that hate was in those men...It’s hard.”
Vaughan testified that messages from Travis McMichael showed he used racist language the most frequently, regularly using slurs and epithets about Black people. In at least one instance, prosecutors previously said, the younger McMichael has called Black people “animals, criminals, monkeys, [and] sub-human savages.”
The FBI agent also walked jurors through several conversations involving the younger McMichael, including one where he allegedly blamed “fucking [n-words] running the show” when he was having trouble getting his commercial driver’s license. In another text, McMichael seemed to appreciate a blackface Halloween costume meant to resemble Trayvon Martin, a Black 17-year-old gunned down by a so-called neighborhood watchman in Florida a decade ago.
McMichael also allegedly sent a video to a Facebook friend showing a Black child dancing while the song “Alabama [N-word]” by Johnny Rebel played in the background. Rebel is an extremely controversial country singer from the 1960s whose songs feature racial slurs.
Notably, Vaughan said, law enforcement agents were unable to break the encryption on Gregory McMichael’s phone—but were able to glean that the former cop and investigator for local prosecutors expressed bias similar to fellow defendants’. The elder McMichael allegedly posted memes on Facebook that included one suggesting white, Irish people had been treated worse than any other enslaved group.
“When was the last time you heard an Irishman bitching about how the world owes them a living?” the meme said, according to Vaughan.
Diane Jackson, Arbery’s aunt, told AJC that while it hurt to read some of the messages the trio wrote, the evidence against Gregory McMichael was the hardest to hear because of his lengthy career in law enforcement.
“We’ve got to be better than this,” Jackson said.
Prosecutors previously said the elder McMichael made a negative comment after the 2015 death of Julian Bond, a Black civil rights activist, and former Georgia state representative. “Bad?! I wish he'd been put in the ground years ago. He’s nothing but trouble. Those Blacks are nothing but trouble,” McMichael allegedly told a witness while he was still himself involved in law enforcement. That witness is set to testify during this trial.
But in what may represent the most personal example of racism from the trio, Vaughan revealed messages meant to showcase Bryan’s sentiments after learning his daughter was dating a Black man just days before Arbery’s murder. While prosecutors previously gave a preview of the defendant’s alleged racism in response to learning about her love interest, Wednesday brought excruciating new details.
In a Feb. 19, 2020, message written by Bryan’s daughter, she expressed how excited she was for her new relationship with someone she said loved her and cared about her education. In the message, which was forwarded to Bryan, his daughter mentions her new love interest’s racial identity, insisting that “it’s just a color” and doesn’t “make me love him less.”
“She has her a [n-word] now. I’ve been calling it for a while. Not surprised,” Bryan allegedly said about the situation to another person later that day. In another message, Vaughan said on Wednesday, Bryan called his daughter a “sociopath” for her dating choices.
When Bryan’s daughter made her relationship Facebook official in April 2020, Bryan allegedly told a friend: “If she doesn’t give a fuck about herself, why should we.”
Vaughan also said that Bryan had a horrific running joke with a friend about serving as “grand marshal” of a Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade—which he also referred to as a “monkey parade.”
“I think the joke is that he would never do that because he doesn't care for Black people or MLK day,” the FBI agent told the jury about Bryan.
Defense attorneys for the trio told jurors during opening arguments that their clients may have concerning internet histories, but that does not necessarily mean their actions in February 2020 were driven by hate. During the state trial, the defense teams unsuccessfully argued that the incident was simply a citizen’s arrest gone wrong.
Pete Theodocion, Bryan’s lawyer, told jurors on Monday that he did not take the case to “defend racism”—but did acknowledge that his client used language the attorney was embarrassed about.
Still, the defense lawyer insisted Bryan does not see “the entire world through the prism of race” and would have acted the same way on the day of Arbery’s death if the man being pursued was “white, Hispanic, or Asian.”
“He never wanted any physical harm to Mr. Arbery,” Theodocion claimed.
